A Face on Every Skull
by Covalent Bond
Summary: "I see a face on every skull," she'd told a courtroom once. As with everything else Temperance Brennan had ever said, she meant that literally…. How does she read the bones so well? And what price does she pay to do it? Eventual romance. Part 1 is finished! Part 2 begins with chapter 21.
1. A Face on Every Skull

Author's Explanation (Updated): About a week ago, after I dared her to write a certain story that you all will hopefully see some day, Casket4mytears took her revenge by asking me to write a story with this prompt: "What was going on with Brennan during Ghost in the Machine." So I watched the episode twice, gave it some thought, and suddenly inspiration hit. I doubt this is what she expected, but surprises are always welcome, especially birthday surprises. :)

_Short on time?_ This is a two part story. Part One ends at Chapter 20, roughly 81,000 words, and it's a completely self contained story. Part Two begins with Chapter 21 and will pick up where Part One ended. I expect Part Two will run approximately 20 chapters also.

Disclaimer: Many talented people own these characters and plot lines, but alas, I am not among them. I'm just plucking out the threads that are already there and weaving an entirely different kind of story from them. I am not profiting from this story in any material way. Any lines I borrow are lovingly used to illustrate a larger story that I believe might have been hidden in the television show all along.

Spoiler Alert: I will be taking a couple of scenes from the recent episode, Ghost in the Machine. I do not intend to give away the ending, but merely to develop certain themes and questions the episode brings up. This chapter has a spoiler for the opening scene of the episode (first few minutes). In the final two or three chapters there will be references again (but so far after the episode aired that they aren't considered spoilers any longer unless your country doesn't have access to US Season 8 episodes. For those overseas, I will leave a warning when we get to them.

* * *

~Q~

_"I see a face on every skull," she'd told a courtroom once. As with everything else Temperance Brennan had ever said, she meant that literally…._

~Q~

~A Face on Every Skull~

~Q~

**The sense of death is most in apprehension;  
And the poor beetle that we tread upon,  
In corporal sufferance feels a pang as great  
As when a giant dies. **

_Measure for Measure, Act III, scene 1, line 77._

It had happened this fast a few times before.

Dr. Temperance Brennan stepped beside her colleague, Dr. Jack Hodgins, and looked down into the skull he'd uncovered and wrested away from agitated wasps. She gazed into the twin ocular orbits, seeing the face slowly form before her own eyes. A nose sprouted from the nasal bone, grew together from the sides and base of the nasal aperture, lengthening into tapered nares. She saw eyes closed, brows feathering above the supraorbital ridges. The face was symmetrical, vaguely feminine, yet under Hodgins's palms she could see the angle of the mandibular ramus suggested male. He'd had a male jawline.

As she studied the bones curiously, a silken ripple of thought disturbed her, feeling like someone had blown out their birthday candles inside of her own cranium. She fought off the urge to shiver, held back her frown, and let her gaze sweep over what Hodgins beheld. The ripples in her mind brushed faintly over her thoughts as if whispered from within the auditory center of her brain. Words formed.

_"Please help me…"_

Brennan dropped her gaze and asked Hodgins to do something about the wasps. Their buzzing was making her imagine she'd heard something.

As she walked away, returning to the long bones that were still bundled in an old sleeping bag, the buzzing followed her. She heard someone speaking to her and almost had to force herself to look up into her partner's concerned eyes.

"Is everything okay?" he asked.

She nodded, gesturing to where Hodgins was now applying a fast-acting insecticide. "I'm waiting for Hodgins to clear out the wasps."

While she waited for the insecticide to do its work, she quickly assessed the length and fusion of epiphyseal plates of the long bones. The secondary centers of ossification at the distal end of the humerus had begun to fuse as well as those at the proximal end of the femur, suggesting an age of approximately 13-14 years old.

A few moments later, Hodgins called her back over to the skull and her partner, Special Agent Seeley Booth stood anxiously by while Brennan inspected it more carefully. "The skull is congruent with the other bones we've uncovered."

"One victim, that's good," Booth remarked. "So, he was probably wrapped in that sleeping bag and covered with a layer of dirt."

Turning the skull carefully in her palms, Brennan tried to ignore the features that floated over bones. What she 'saw' could not be quantified, not until Angela recreated it. Instead, a forensic anthropologist had to focus on what was in front of her, only the information that could go into a scientific report and be accepted in a legal court case. This skull had small, squared orbits and an inverted, heart-shaped nasal opening. The front teeth jutted forward slightly. The zygomatic was sharply angled and the chin sharp and narrow. There was a bit of projection around the upper lateral orbital ridges. The frontal bone sloped slightly off the brow but rose steadily to the top above the glabella.

Most of these observations she kept to herself, knowing Booth would lose his patience with her. All he wanted to know was gender and age, and race if she could give it to him. The markers in the bone were indistinct, however. This person had been young, pubescent. Secondary sexual characteristics had not really begun to develop so she could not declare gender with any certainty. She never liked working gender with just skulls even when she knew they were adults.

"How were the remains found," Brennan inquired, mostly to keep Booth busy with something other than pestering her for gender.

"A real estate agent estimating this place for resale and they heard the wasps." They were inside of a green house that seemed to have spent the last year or two in disuse. That question and answer was used up far too quickly, and Booth came out next with the question she'd been hoping to avoid a little longer.

"So, what do you think?" Booth asked. "Man or a woman?"

Brennan's mouth opened for a half second, but she stalled. "I ... am uncomfortable defining sex from just a skull." Especially from _this_ skull, because she still wasn't sure. The bone markers were slightly androgynous.

"Oh, come on. Take a stab." Booth began cajoling her with the slightest hint of teasing. "I won't write anything down, I promise. Just between me and you." He glanced beside him at Hodgins, who had appeared at his elbow. "Oh, well..." Booth shrugged. It was only Hodgins.

Hodgins laughed. "What," he called defensively. Seeing the reluctant expression Brennan wore, his shoulders fell. "You don't want to take a stab in front of me." Clearly the thought had wounded him, just a little.

"I feel inhibited by my desire not to embarrass myself in front of another scientist."

But that wasn't it. Despite how irrational she knew it would sound, it wasn't Hodgins she was worried about guessing wrong in front of. Brennan turned back to the skull, waiting for her intuition or whatever it was to give her the final clue. The bone structure wasn't enough.

Hodgins scoffed gesturing to Booth. "What about him?"

Absently, she rattled off something about synergy and having sex, which accomplished her goal. Booth blushed and sent Hodgins packing. Once Hodgins was gone, Booth leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper. "So, what do ya think? Go ahead."

"Orbit shape square, orbit size small. Placement in the skull, low. These are extremely telling morphometrics." But she knew she wasn't telling Booth anything. She was hedging, covering her ... mule? No, ass. Yes, covering her ass.

Booth sighed impatiently. "A little hint, Bones."

Brennan turned back to the skull, her gaze flickering over the face. Finally, settling on the jaw, she threw her best guess out. "Male."

"Male!"

The scratching of pen on paper drew her sharply around. "You said you wouldn't write anything down!"

"I'm just writing down morphometrics so I can look it up later on." It was almost the charm smile he sent to her. His eyes had begun to twinkle, but before it could fully bloom, Brennan's lack of receptivity seemed to register.

"I can be more definite about age. Pubescent."

Booth's hands fell to his sides, all pretense at joking fleeing. "It's a kid?"

Brennan nodded and returned to the rest of the skeleton. "Partial fusion of the distal humerus and femoral head." *

"A kid," Booth repeated dispiritedly.

Hodgins heard and walked back over, his gaze fixed on the skull. "A kid? Oh, man. How old?"

"Thirteen or fourteen."

"Oh, I hate when it's a kid."

Brennan didn't recall Hodgins ever having strong feelings about the age of victims in the past. She might have said something (inappropriate, blunt, thoughtless) before, but now she knew what had changed for him. "Well, that's because you have a son yourself and you can't help but draw the connection."

Booth nudged her. "Same with me though, and Parker."

Brennan knew that. Booth had always gotten upset about kids, ever since she'd known him. At times he'd even lost his patience with her, when she didn't show enough turmoil to satisfy his level of disquiet. She'd always rationalized away her feelings, and she did that now. "Fortunately for me, Christine is a girl, and so the comparison is not as close to home."

So there was no reason to feel upset. It's not Christine. It's not Parker either. Brennan gazed at the face she saw, knowing he was somebody's son.

She felt Booth's steady hand on her shoulder. "Christine's going to be fine, all right?"

Christine is a girl, a baby, she's at home and safe. It was irrational, the way she was feeling, this prickling of tears and the tightness in her throat. "I feel a sudden desire to hold her."

"We will," he promised.

"And you should call Parker," Brennan added. Unnecessarily, she knew.

"I will."

Brennan lifted the skull, carefully placing it in a box. She lingered a moment, studying his face. For a moment she felt compelled to say something, but there was only bone and clinging dirt resting in the box. This boy couldn't hear her. With a resigned sigh, she turned away to focus on gathering soil samples from under the body.

~Q~

* * *

*Scientific Note: in the episode, Brennan gives the age as 13-14 based on partial fusion of the distal radius and acromion. However, my source indicates that fusion begins in the humerus and femur at this age (the radius is later). The clavicle is actually the last bone to fuse, usually in the early to mid 20s. The clavicle (collar bone) joins the scapula (shoulder blade) and where they join is called the acromion. My source is Human Osteology, 3rd Edition, by White, Black & Folkens. Sorry Hart Hanson, I'm going with the 'expert' at my disposal on this.

Author's Note: We're beginning at Ghost in the Machine because this is where we're going to end when the story is finished. The remaining chapters are going to go back to the beginning (the very beginning) to show how two pivotal relationships plus one amazing talent shapes Brennan's reactions to the dead, not just in Ghost in the Machine, but with every skull she comes into contact with.

As with all of my stories (unless otherwise specified), I write from canon. If I put something in this story, it's because I have a textual justification. That is to say, I've got an actual moment from the show itself, or a quote from Hart Hanson himself, that backs me up. I'm telling a story here that I think has been hidden all along, and it was finally revealed in Ghost in the Machine.


	2. The Singer Who Was Silenced

Disclaimer: I still do not own these wonderful characters, just imagining how a certain friendship ever got started.

Author's Note: I've taken my cue from the already established friendship between Brennan and Angela that we were introduced to in the Pilot, based upon the way it got started in the 100th episode. How did that strong friendship develop so quickly? What does Angela see in Brennan?

* * *

~Q~

~The Singer Who Was Silenced~

~Q~

**Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;  
To lie in cold obstruction and to rot. **

_Measure for Measure, Act III, scene 1, line 118._

~Q~

**Northwestern University  
February 1998**

When she held her first human skull, Brennan was still learning the names of things. Every part and parcel of bone had a name, a description of where it was, what it did, and what it connected to. Words like ramus (a large, bony projection that juts out at an angle) and condyle (a smooth, rounded bump where bones join) were only just being joined together with other words like mandible (jaw bone) and masseter (chewing muscle). Put them all together, and eventually Temperance Brennan would be able to identify a jaw bone as belonging to a male or a female just by its size, the sharpness of its 'chin,' the strength of muscle attachment; and its age just by looking at any attached teeth.

That uncanny ability was still a few years away when she first envisioned a face. Sitting in her human osteology class, turning the skull carefully so she could note certain structures and begin to make her measurements, Brennan looked into the skull's empty eye sockets and saw brown. Brown eyes, high cheeks, skin the color of coffee with just slightly too much cream. Without taking measurements and plotting morphometric characteristics from standardized charts, without 'science,' Brennan could already see the face of this 'Caucasian' specimen didn't match the racial category someone had placed it in. She suddenly raised her hand until the professor came to her.

"Who did this skull belong to?" Brennan asked. "Is there a way to find out?"

"It came from one of our exemplar collections."

Brennan studied the zygomatic bones carefully, tracing the curve with a tender fingertip. "Was she mixed race? African and Caucasian. About 20-25 years old."

Frowning, Professor Johnston leaned in for a closer look himself. When his eyes had flickered over the skull, evidently confirming his own suspicions, he held out his hand to receive the skull. He tipped it carefully, noting the cataloging number inked at the base of the occipital. "I'll check, Ms. Brennan. I confess, you have me intrigued."

He returned the skull to her and promised he would check the skull's provenance after class.

The following morning, as she was about to leave the osteology lab, Professor Johnston asked her to stay behind a moment. "You were correct. The specimen you were examining yesterday did indeed belong to a young mulatto woman from the mid 19th Century. I'm surprised you were able to detect it; mixed racial characteristics are notoriously difficult to quantify."

Brennan shook her head, still uncertain herself how she'd visualized it. "I just saw her." A face had floated over the bone almost like a painting or a photograph.

"You have a gift for this kind of work," he said slowly. "You should not let it go to waste."

~Q~

She didn't let her talents go to waste; rather, Dr. Temperance Brennan became one of the best physical anthropologists in the world. Most of the time, Brennan had to work at it in order to bring out a face. She specialized in ancient remains and painstakingly reconstructed faces, lifestyles, injuries. Most of the people she worked with were dusty and still, their faces teased out by layers of clay smoothed over tissue depth markers. Most of them were silently content with their lot, having happily lived and then left their lives in the company of loved ones.

She cataloged them or vetted them as authentic. Sometimes she wrote journal articles explaining how she'd arrived at particular conclusions regarding diet, dress, cause of death.

But once in a while, a face floated freely over the skull. Every now and then a word scraped roughly over her subconscious and alerted her to look … there. To notice ... that. Sometimes, the bones spoke to her. (That's what Angela called it, although Brennan never failed to point out bones did not have mouths and thus they could not speak.)

Still, at times the bones did speak and she always listened very carefully when they did.

One 4000 year old man's bones rustled and hissed when she touched them, his face floating fretfully over his skull. Brennan bent towards his ribs, fingers drifting over the curves and tiny grooves until she found the tip of an arrow wedged into the space between his seventh posterior rib and the inferior angle of his left scapula. Someone had driven a spear into him and broken the tip of the arrow when it hit the scapula, a feat that would have been impossible if the man were standing. He'd been lying down, the attacker coming at him from the right side.

Murdered in his sleep, four thousand years ago.

Publishing her findings in this ancient murder case was what eventually brought Temperance Brennan's name to the attention of an FBI Agent named Seeley Booth. Solving his four year old murder case was what brought her to the attention of the best friend she would ever have.

~Q~

**August 2004**

"Hey, you wanna go out and maybe get some drinks? You look the same way I feel."

Brennan glanced up in surprise to find Angela Montenegro standing uncertainly at the door to her office. Going out did not appeal to her at all—she'd had enough alcohol last night to last a month—but the only alternative was to stay at work and brood, or go home and brood. She wasn't really the brooding type and generally lacked experience at the proper brooding technique. Ordinarily, Brennan preferred to bury herself in work when her mind was unsettled but tonight the work itself had unsettled her. The idea of drinking her troubles away was one she hadn't considered yet and despite her desire to avoid anything harder than a glass or two of wine for the foreseeable future, the idea tempted her.

Because, she thought, having company and companionship might not be such a bad idea. Brennan was feeling decidedly off-balance, disturbed, sad, and bitter. Booth had her seething, but the young woman whose murder she'd just solved still haunted her.

Gazing curiously at Angela's drawn face, she asked, "How do you feel?"

"Like I need to get away from that." Angela gestured behind herself, unmistakably pointing towards the forensic platform where the murdered girl's bones were waiting to be released to her family.

Brennan had needed to get away from that area as well, for a little while, but had fully intended to return to work within an hour or two. She still had several reports to prepare before the court case got underway. Leaving the lab would be longer than just a little while, however. If she left, she probably wouldn't come back until morning. Angela's invitation was starting to appeal to her even more now that she'd considered her alternatives.

With a tired sigh, Brennan grabbed her coat and headed past the artist she'd just hired a couple of days ago. She walked up the steps of the platform briskly, leaving Angela to remain behind, curious and just slightly miffed about being ignored, but Angela's expression changed when she saw what Brennan was doing.

A skull was resting on a foam block, surveying all the other bones set out below it in anatomical order on the table like a queen over her loyal subjects. Brennan went to the skull and gazed down on it with something like regret. "Booth says I can't take you with me. You're evidence." She bit her lip, studying the bone structure very carefully. "I'll be back tomorrow."

Abruptly, she spun back and returned to Angela without any explanation. "Where are we going," she asked casually, walking towards the exit as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.

Angela had remained stalled at the base of the platform, her head tilted quizzically. "What was that all about?"

"What was what." Brennan sounded vague and kept herself busy at the exit pawing for car keys in her messenger bag.

"You spoke to it."

"Spoke to what." She had the keys out. Lifting her steady grey-green gaze at last, Brennan's face was smooth and blank.

"You spoke to that skull."

Brennan glanced back at the table, then turned back to Angela almost defiantly. "I was thinking out loud."

Angela Montenegro made her living observing everything, mostly what she could see. But occasionally what she could hear, and she'd heard Temperance Brennan telling that skull the reason she wasn't taking it with her. A chill ran down her arms. "You took it home with you last night."

How morbid was this woman who walked around with skulls in her purse? Angela was starting to get the creeps, but the unmistakable grief that flickered in the anthropologist's eyes arrested her disgust. It wasn't morbid at all, what drove Brennan; it was something else entirely.

"She's not an '_it_,'" Brennan corrected fiercely. "She was a sixteen year old girl, a singer. She was alone for four years in a garbage dump. She was locked in the trunk of a car for a day."

This last came out sounding strangled.

"Well, she was already dead when that happened, right?"

Those ghostly silver eyes were glinting like pebbles at the bottom of a clear, rushing steam: visibly sharp and distinct, and yet it was impossible to tell how deep the water ran over them. "No one belongs in the trunk of a car."

Not dead, not alive. Not ever.

Angela's feelings on the matter exactly, except that Brennan seemed to be drowning in sorrow. The haunted pain rolling off of the other woman almost took Angela's breath away. She wanted to paint what she was seeing right now, to capture the terrible beauty of Temperance Brennan's passion and grief, but sensed it wasn't the right time. She knew she would see this again if she stuck around, however.

Knowing her initial instincts about Brennan were correct, she decided someone needed to pull this poor woman out of this cursed laboratory and out into the world of the living once in a while. Angela suddenly took Brennan's arm and ushered her out of the lab, her decision made. This wasn't about Paris anymore. Brennan cared too much, she connected too deeply, and it would destroy her if someone didn't intervene.

"You shouldn't dwell on it," Angela chided. "Let's just go and forget about it. Okay?"

Brennan's shoulders sagged a little. "I can't forget."

"Just for a couple of hours."

~Q~

Angela had wanted a rousing nightclub with thumping rhythms and legions of horny men scoping her out. Brennan had insisted on a quieter lounge nearby, claiming she still had a headache from the Tequila.

"So, what happened last night?" Angela inquired with a salacious grin. "You and Agent Studly see any action?"

"I told you I didn't sleep with him," Brennan reminded her gruffly.

"But you wanted to…"

Shaking her head slowly, Brennan heaved another sigh. "Not like that."

Angela settled in for a juicy story, sensing that whatever 'like that' meant, it was important. "Like what?"

Toying idly with the cardboard coaster her wine glass was supposed to be resting upon, Brennan allowed her anger and disappointment to emerge just briefly. "He got me drunk, then he fired me."

"Okay…." Angela prompted. "Then what?"

"Why did he get me drunk first?"

Angela shrugged. "Was he drinking, too?"

"Yes."

"Bad judgment call, then. So, what happened?"

"We kissed."

Angela squealed so loudly Brennan's head nearly imploded. She winced, glancing around sheepishly at the other patrons of the lounge. They had earned a few raised brows, but evidently Angela didn't care enough to stop her excited gushing.

"How was it? Was he a great kisser? I'll bet he was. Those lips, those shoulders. Tell me you got to touch his shoulders…."

"Angela!" Despite her torn feelings over Seeley Booth, Brennan couldn't help smiling a little at the artist's enthusiasm. "We were both drunk, so I went home. Alone."

Ah, so 'like that' must have meant drunk. Temperance Brennan didn't do drunken hook-ups. Angela filed that away for future reference. "Okay, but you're going to see him again, right?"

"No." Brennan took a long sip of her Merlot, savoring it over the lingering bite of Tequila and Booth that still held court in her mouth. Kissing him was a bad idea. What the hell was she thinking, throwing caution to the wind and hurling herself at his oasis like a woman dying of thirst. It was nothing but a mirage. "He hired me back this morning. FBI Agents can't date consultants."

"But the case is over," Angela pointed out.

"Don't you get it, Angela? FBI Agents can't date consultants. He got me drunk, then he fired me. We kissed…. But I didn't go home with him and the next day he hired me right back. He didn't say a word about it. Doesn't that mean what I think it means?"

"That he's an ass?"

Brennan snorted, then laughed. "He does have a fine ass."

"He _is_ an ass, but most men are," Angela assured her. "That's why you let them screw your brains out a couple of times and then kick them to the curb before they can mess with your head."

The startled look Brennan threw her made Angela snicker. "What, you never took some guy home to have your wicked way with him, just for the hell of it?"

"No." It wasn't disapproval, more like surprise. As if the idea hadn't ever occurred to her, nor the opportunity. "I don't get out much," she shrugged. Men generally weren't interested in her. Then again, most men didn't interest Brennan either. Seeley Booth had been an anomaly in both those respects, an observation that Brennan found herself struggling to explain. The many things she felt around and about him defied her efforts to quantify and dismiss as merely a troublesome biochemical fare-up. Hormones running amok did not explain why she felt so achingly raw in the places he'd wounded her.

They fell silent for a moment. Angela gestured to the waiter to bring them another round. "Hey, since we're talking about things not explained in the morning…"

Glad for the change in topic, Brennan waited expectantly with one brow lifted.

"Why did you offer me a permanent job this morning?"

The question sent another unhealthy bolus of wine rushing down Brennan's throat as she stalled for a moment, because she wasn't sure how to answer that without sounding like she'd made an irrational decision. She had just followed an almost whispered idea that Angela was the right artist to choose for the job of drawing Jemma. (Booth had called it 'intestines' or something, but no one in their right mind made decisions with their digestive system. Well, except maybe hungry people did.) That she was still thinking of him coupled with that irrelevant bit of intestinal randomness made Brennan eye her glass with dismay and she set it aside. She hadn't been herself over the last few days and didn't know quite what had brought about the changes.

She studied Angela with the same intensity she ordinarily employed on bones, tracking bone structure under flesh, noting Angela's mixed ancestry. The artist had a beautiful zygomatic structure, and lovely winging brows that flew above her eyes like birds in flight. Angela's question awaited her answer but before she knew what her answer would be, Brennan knew she had to ask a question of her own.

"Why did you draw earrings on her?"

"What?" Angela tipped her head, completely bewildered.

"When you drew Jemma Arrington, you put in details that can't be empirically known. You styled her hair, and you drew large hoop earrings. Why?" She'd known from Angela's work that the artist had an eye for bone structure and the sculpting of muscles under flesh. Yet the sketch of Jemma had exceeded her expectations to an astonishing degree. That fact had been slammed home when she sat in the FBI conference room with Agent Booth and watched Jemma sing. From only a skull and Brennan's tissue depth markers, Angela had drawn _Jemma_, a portrait just as stunningly accurate as if the living girl had posed for her.

With a small, self-deprecating laugh, Angela shrugged and avoided Brennan's direct gaze. "It just felt like the right thing to do."

"You drew her the way she looked during her last performance. She was wearing those earrings." Brennan closed her eyes, seeing Jemma's face, hearing her low, gentle alto humming against the piano's somber notes. She saw the soft cheeks, the glowing, intelligent eyes, the musical smile. "You see her, the same way I do."

When she opened them again, Brennan turned to Angela and found the artist looking gravely serious. The two women remained suspended eye-to-eye, pondering each other's respective gifts, and the implications of a partnership.

"Do you believe in ghosts, Brennan?"

"No, of course not."

"I do," Angela shrugged. "Don't you think it's possible?"

She laughed, shaking her head. "Logically, no. Consciousness cannot exist absent electrical activity in the nervous system. Death stops all electric impulses; ergo, death ends consciousness."

"What about illogically?" Angela quipped.

"I don't know what that means," Brennan frowned.

"You were talking to Jemma's skull, and carrying it around with you. Why bother if there's nothing there?"

"There _is_ nothing there," Brennan insisted. "I just … feel bad that she was alone for so long."

"Jemma doesn't care anymore," Angela pointed out gently. "Only you do."

Brennan looked away, another wisp of ineffable sorrow passing over her features. "Someone should."

"Yeah." Angela fortified herself with another drink. There was a lot to consider, both the short term financial gain of having a steady income, and the long-term cost of giving in to the demands of the dead. She'd felt something when she looked at that skull and drew that sketch; it was a sensation unlike any she'd ever experienced before. The very idea of tying herself down to a serious job involving death and justice went against every inclination she had, except for one: the realization that for the first time, her art had actually moved someone. She'd drawn a sketch and made a difference in more than one life. That was the force pulling her in: her own desire to leave her mark in the world through art, and the recognition that Brennan had given her a way to do it.

"Look, if I do this, I refuse to drink alone. You're coming with me, every night. I'm going to drag you out of that lab with me."

Brennan chuffed another soft laugh, but didn't contain her curiosity. "Why?"

"Because you're going to lose yourself in there," Angela warned.

The fact that Brennan didn't argue with her told Angela she was right, and even Brennan knew it.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: This is where we start, with Angela's story and how she is woven into Brennan's life. There's one more fundamental relationship (Booth) and his story will be woven into Brennan's as the story progresses.

If there's something you liked, let me know. If there's something you didn't like, let me know that, too. If you've got a question I will definitely answer it. Detailed reviews make me a better writer, which will ensure you get a better story. :)


	3. The Man in the Bog

Author's Note: I'm posting this today to keep a promise, however I've cut the chapter short because of the subject. It just didn't seem right to go there today.

My deepest condolences go out to the people of Newtown CT, to all the families who are suffering, and to the doctors, cops and others who have to keep working in order to save lives and bring about whatever justice can be found.

* * *

~Q~

~The Man in the Bog~

~Q~

**Thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die,  
Passing through nature to eternity.  
**_Hamlet, Act I, scene 2, line 72. _

~Q~

"So, who is this?" Angela asked, glancing to the shield and broadsword laying near the fragile bones Brennan was bent over. "Conan the Barbarian?"

Brennan paused in her examination of the Celtic warrior whose remains she had been asked to authenticate. "Barbarian is an inexact term referring to various tribes—"

"No, I meant … oh, never mind." After cutting off the dissertation, Angela cut herself off with a sigh. She didn't care about real barbarians and Brennan didn't care about fictional movie characters, even if the actor had been sort of hot in a primitive, 'barbarian' kind of way. Besides, it didn't take a genius to notice that Temperance Brennan had already been sucked back into the vortex of ancient discovery.

Angela had to say her name three more times before she got her attention, and the only reason she succeeded in breaking through, Angela suspected, is because she also threw in a little historical tease.

"Earth to Brennan. Hey, isn't this shield iron age or something?"

"What?" Brennan glanced up sharply.

Ah yes, the key to Brennan's attention was always something involving either science or ancient history. Angela smirked and gestured. "Iron age. How old is your guy?"

"How do you know that it's iron age?"

A laugh, because as much as she loved her, Brennan often failed to recall Angela was an expert in her own way. "I'm an artist. We study art history."

The scowl she earned for that remark made Angela chuckle again. "Seriously, though, I think this is La Tene, pre-Celtic. These spirals are called Triskele and they are very distinctive elements of Celtic art. If your body is from England and I had to guess, I'd say this shield dates from around … 300-100 CE."

"That corresponds to the age given by carbon dating." Brennan was already diving back into the bones.

Knowing she was losing Brennan again, Angela spoke fast. "Hey! Do you need me to draw a face for him?"

With an impatient sigh, Brennan straightened and looked at the skull thoughtfully. It was still remarkably intact, the bones and even some leathery skin having been preserved by the peat bog he'd been recovered from. He'd had a long nose and narrow eyes set beneath harshly ridged brows. She shrugged lightly. "It's not a rush. He's content."

_Content?_ Angela gaped at her friend, marveling that after almost four months of working with Brennan the anthropologist still managed to confound her. The scientist who insisted there was no such thing as souls or consciousness after death, would occasionally say things that implied not just consciousness, but some sort of post-mortem emotional status. How could a corpse be 'content?'

"And by content, you mean…..?"

"He wasn't a murder victim. This man died a natural death." Surrounded in life and death by friends and family, he'd been happy, so to speak, right up until he'd died and his remains had been placed in a bog.

"So….?" Angela prompted again.

Brennan lifted her gaze again, clearly starting to wish Angela would let her work uninterrupted. "So he doesn't need to be identified. Although…" Another pause, another sigh and then Brennan finally conceded, "there may be historical interest in his portrait."

"You need me to help you with the tissue depths?"

"No, I'll do it tonight," Brennan replied absently.

Angela reacted with surprise and a tinge of outrage. "What? No, you promised you'd go out on a double date with Steve and me tonight. You remember? Steve's friend is Jason, he's a high school teacher."

The groan Brennan emitted sounded like acute distress. She glared fiercely at Angela, as if she'd just discovered Angela had volunteered Brennan herself to teach a kindergarten class. "What does he teach?"

"Psychology and—"

"Oh, no. No. I hate psychology!" Was that whining? Brennan glared and groaned again. How the hell had she ever promised Angela she would go on a double date?

"What, he's not going to psychoanalyze you," Angela laughed. "Not on the first date, anyway."

"Angela," she protested. "I don't recall anything about making promises. You know I don't do that."

"You might have been a bit distracted when I asked," Angela admitted impishly. She'd waited until Brennan was engrossed in writing the novel she'd started working on last month, then slipped in the suggestion while bantering about Steve. Brennan had nodded and waved her off, which Angela now gleefully interpreted as assent.

Another barbed glare all but drew blood. "I'm sort of seeing this guy I might have mentioned. You know, his name is Peter?"

"You've gone out with him twice. That's not dating." When that didn't work, she stooped to begging. "Come on, just this once….?"

"Why do I let you talk me into these things?" Brennan shook her head, felt herself weakening.

Angela laughed. "'Cause without me your life would be boring."

"Without you I'd get more work done!" Brennan declared, but she was smiling as Angela laughed and floated away.

~Q~

"How do you do that so accurately?" Brennan asked the next morning. She'd wandered into Angela's office with a cup of coffee and set it gently beside the busy artist.

Angela nodded gratefully for the cup of alertness and took a sip. It was sweet and creamy, just the way she loved it, and the fact that Brennan knew how to prepare her a cup warmed her more than the drink itself. "You want to know how I draw?"

Brennan had tilted her head, her gaze focusing intently. "I have no trouble visualizing cheeks, the brow. Getting the nose just right escapes me sometimes, but you are always accurate. You trained to do forensic art?"

"No!" Laughing at the idea, Angela sat back and studied her own work thoughtfully. "When I was in college, there was this really cute guy who wanted to be a medical illustrator. Esoteric, I know. I followed him around, which is to say I took some of the same classes he did: human anatomy being the most important one. Sometimes it's like ... I can just look at a skull and see muscle covering it, then fat pads, then the skin."

"Yes," Brennan agreed softly. "Exactly."

Setting her cup back down, Angela reached out to swipe at an extra glob of clay that had overly thickened one of the woman's cheeks. This was an unidentified adult female who was found in a park in 1994; Brennan had begun the case two days ago and the hope was that a facial reconstruction would help some long-lost friend or relative recognize her.

"That side, too," Brennan suggested.

Canting a brow, Angela evened the other side. They both sat back again and looked at the face that stared sightlessly back at them.

"That's her," Brennan said softly, as if she were satisfied that the portrait accurately matched the subject. Then she shifted restlessly. "Wouldn't it be better if we didn't have to coat the the bones in clay?"

"You mean, have me just sketch them free hand, like I did with Gemma Arrington?" Angela pursed her lips and reached for her coffee again. "I can't always see the face that clearly."

"No, I was thinking we could develop a computer program that would overlay muscle and tissue. We could tweak the variables, change skin, hair and eye color." The one complicating factor in doing clay reconstructions was that the bone was altered and therefore compromised by the clay. Usually police cases were turned into clay reconstructions as a desperate last effort at identification. Historical remains were too delicate and fragile, unless a special cast of the original bones was made, but that process also put stress on the bone. A digital imaging program would give more flexibility and preserve the bone at the same time. Brennan had held onto this idea for quite a while, and with Angela's expertise it might actually be possible.

The idea was already taking flight as Angela also imagined possibilities. "All that we'd need from the skull would be the measurements."

"Right. The morphometrics would go into the program and we'd be able to discern potential faces rather quickly."

"But who's going to write the program?"

"You will." Brennan was giving Angela that direct gaze again. "You said you took some computer programming classes."

"Right. Me." Angela laughed again, thinking the idea was both the most ridiculous and the most amazing thing she'd ever considered. "Maybe Zack can help, too. He's good with numbers."

As she said it, Zack appeared at the door with a harried expression. "I'm sorry Dr. Brennan. That FBI Agent is calling again."

Brennan's eyes flashed like sunlit glass. "Tell him I'll speak to him when hell freezes over."

The only reason Zack didn't take that as the literal message Brennan intended him to reply to Agent Booth with, was the fact that he wasn't sure when hell was actually scheduled to freeze. "Could you give me a more definite time?"

Angela burst out laughing, making Zack more than a bit confused. Taking another look at Angela's smirk and Brennan's puckered brow finally must have clued Zack into undercurrents and the idea that hell by definition could not freeze. So, Brennan must have been speaking metaphorically. "I'll tell him you're in a meeting," Zack decided and shuffled back out.

"Why won't you talk to him?" Angela asked, amused and yet clearly admiring the stubborn persistence of Seeley Booth and the equally determined resistance of Temperance Brennan. "He's been calling every few days for months now. That fact alone ought to earn him five minutes of your time."

"Why would I reward a stalker?" she snapped. "Not taking 'no' for an answer is not a desirable trait in a man."

"He's not stalking. He's acting more like a jilted boyfriend." When all she got for that observation was a blank look, Angela sighed. "What did he do that pissed you off so much you won't even speak to him?"

Brennan looked away at that, her eyes washed with pain and a trace of fear. "It was something he said." And that was all _she_ would say, no matter how much Angela tried to pry more out of her.

~Q~

Five months after she'd started working at the Jeffersonian, Angela stood at the edge of the office space Brennan had arranged for her and wondered how she'd become so fortunate. She had filled the enormous space with her easel and a number of paintings, plus other art pieces that either informed her work or inspired her senses. The room had a large window for natural light, plenty of space, and the beginnings of a three-dimensional digital projector that she and Brennan had designed to create and adapt facial and scene reconstructions.

They'd gotten close so fast that it seemed they'd been friends for a lifetime. Polar opposites in most ways, they still had two things in common: a lost mother, and the inexplicable ability to see the faces of the dead. While Agent Booth's case and the man himself faded from Brennan's mind (except for the nagging phone calls that Zack didn't bother to announce anymore), she'd begun to relax into historical work and seemed to hit it off with a man named Peter.

Angela flittered around, teasing Jack Hodgins, drawing sketches of Egyptian kings and bog beauties, painting in her spare time, and undertaking more of her own relationship adventures solo now that Brennan had found someone. And she had this unbelievable work space. Aside from the changes in Brennan in the last week, this had almost become a dream job.

Brennan had taken her Christmas vacation in El Salvador, determined to dig up graves rather than cavort under the Italian sun as Angela had suggested. She hated Christmas and avoided it thoroughly every year by going on the remotest, most unpleasant digs she could sign up for. The reason, she'd explained, was because her parents had disappeared just before Christmas Eve, her brother had ditched her into foster care a week later and … yeah, Angela could see why the holidays were horrible for her.

So okay, Brennan had run off to bury her pain in a pit of muddy corpses. The un-Christmas vacation had lasted four weeks and during that time, Angela knew, something had happened. It wasn't just the general melancholy that had gripped Brennan in the last few days before she'd left. Since her return seven days ago, she was not the same as she'd been a month earlier. She was quieter and much more intense than before (before now Angela would not have believed it possible for Temperance Brennan to be either quieter or more intense.) But she was both: quiet, intense, almost moody. Brennan startled easily and often seemed to be trapped in an unpleasant memory. When asked, she would shrug and say nothing was wrong … then disappear for hours into the place Angela had dubbed "Limbo."

Brennan's relationship with Peter hit the skids and starting rushing downhill faster than a skier on the suicide slope. Whatever was bothering her, she wasn't telling him anything more than she told Angela. She wouldn't talk about the stress between her and Peter, either, but the first signs of Brennan losing herself started appearing when Peter started accusing Brennan of being distant and cold. That argument took place in the annex just outside the lab and it made Angela's blood boil. Brennan had gone perfectly blank, informing Peter coolly that she had a lot of work to do and wouldn't be home for dinner.

Brennan never came out of Limbo that day, nor the next. When she did finally emerge, she was wearing the same haunted expression that had pulled Angela into this job in the first place. When she began accepting local murder cases, bodies found in the woods, referrals from medical examiners, it became clear that they were starting to return them to the place Angela had once dreaded reaching with Brennan.

The police cases were different from antiquities. There was no art, only pain. These were the ones who had the ability to ruin meals and darken her days; the ones that forced sleepless nights, leaving Angela in a state of ragged exhaustion. These were the faces who made her cry, these murdered, lost souls. Brennan drove herself mercilessly, dragging Angela along with her and the price of justice was getting steep.

The one that nearly made her quit the first time was a child.

~Q~

* * *

Note: For those who are confused, the trip to El Salvador is explained in the season 1 episode, _Woman in the Garden_. Brennan was kidnapped, held in the dark and terrorized for three days. We'll come back to that in a future chapter.


	4. The Lost Child in the Woods

Author's Note: This chapter is dedicated to the children of Newtown, CT.

* * *

~Q~

~Lost Child in the Woods~

~Q~

**There is no following her in this fierce vein.  
**_A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act III, scene 2, line 82 _

The one that nearly made her quit the first time was a child.

~Q~

The skeletal remains of a 9-10 year old child were discovered at the bottom of a ravine in Rock Creek Park, not far away from the National Zoo. The DC Metro PD called in the Medical Examiner, who in turn called the Jeffersonian. Brennan took Zack to the scene and returned a few hours later with bones so small Angela almost fooled herself into thinking they belonged to a large dog. Almost.

Hodgins had claimed the insect specimens Brennan had brought back with her and was busy consoling the captured creatures as he set them up with raw chunks of liver. "Don't worry my little ones, you have escaped the preservative of death and will be allowed to continue your happy little lives unmolested. Let's see who you're going to be, hmm?"

Angela turned away from Hodgins—she still hadn't accustomed herself to his odd proclivities—and faced the mess Brennan and Zack had laid out on a steel table. The three of them stood silently, each seeming to need a moment to gather their thoughts before they could begin. Everything was stained brown, the larger bones clearly broken, and the top of the skull was intact but the facial bones were in pieces. Even the stoic Zack looked disturbed as he took in the extensive damage done to the small bundle of broken bones. "What happened to them?"

"Post-mortem scavenging, most likely. These are teeth marks." Brennan gestured to the ends of several of the bones that looked mashed like a dog's old chew toy. "Probably squirrels and mice. They were after the calcium. The ribs and pelvis were broken by foxes as they tried to access the visceral organs."

Angela shuddered. She did not want to know what had broken up the skull.

Brennan's grey eyes flashed upwards, catching the movement and Angela's mood very quickly. "You don't have to stay here, Angela. I'll reconstruct the skull tonight. You can sketch it tomorrow."

Before Brennan had even finished releasing her Angela had already gone, chased off by the lingering horror of tiny bones broken by gnawing rodent teeth. Squirrels?! Weren't they supposed to be cute and fluffy? Squirrels... Once in the relative peace of her office, she shut the door, turned on music as loud as she knew she could get away with and fell onto her couch. This was a beautiful office, a restful space, but the cost of being here had finally hit home. Now her relaxing work space was well and truly tinged with death. Now she couldn't simply think of fuzzy little squirrels with their large, black eyes and cute little paws, because she would also be imagining their tiny little teeth going to work on a child's dead body.

Brennan was out there, staring down at the shattered bones of a kid, talking about squirrels chewing on them in the same tone normal people talked about their car getting a flat tire because it ran over a nail. This wasn't right, it wasn't normal at all. How could she say something so revolting and _wrong_ in such a casual way? Why wasn't Brennan upset about the squirrels?! Like a normal person would be.

Angela wiped a tear away and wondered at last what the hell she was doing here.

As she watched Angela disappear and the door click shut behind her, Brennan knew she would have to go talk to her, as soon as possible. She turned to her intern to leave him with instructions. "Zack, I need you to carefully sort and catalog each of these bones."

"They're so small," he said softly, almost disbelieving.

Her eyes slid slowly over the tangled mess. "While true, that observation isn't relevant to the job I need you to do."

"I know but..." With a sigh, he seemed to shake off the shock and he made an admirable attempt to refocus. "Does the fact that this is a child change the number of bones I have to look for?"

Brennan nodded. "You will find secondary centers of ossification, places where the long bones have not fused. Most will still be joined by cartilage, however, which should make your job easier."

He was watching her speak with almost desperate intensity. "How do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"How do you not care?"

She froze, her mouth dropping open a bit. The question stung, and consequently she knew she was answering with more anger than she should. "Would it reassure you if I started crying or ran away?"

The way Angela had. The way normal people did. But what kind of message does it send to the student if the teacher loses their composure? If she cried, would that instill greater confidence in Zack, or less...?

Chastened, Zack shook his head.

Taking another moment to recover her fraying control, she reminded him of their roles in this. "I'm here to teach forensic anthropology. You want to be a forensic anthropologist, you're going to face situations like this one. You will see murdered children. If you can't handle it, stop now."

Almost panicking at the idea of being dismissed, Zack spoke fast. "No, I can handle it."

"Good," she agreed quietly. Another moment passed while she struggled to put her feelings into words in her own mind. Crying made her sick, thick-headed, throbbing headache, the tightness in her throat. It clouded her vision and distracted her focus away from the person who needed it most. She refused to cry, but that did not mean the urge did not exist. Brennan forced her gaze onto the jagged edges of broken bones, looking at striations, the spongy trabecular bone that had been exposed in the broken Ilium. She could not look at the whole, only the parts.

Finally, Brennan offered Zack that same insight that she had learned the hard way long ago. "Children are hard. To get through it, I focus on the facts, on what I can see and record. Getting emotional won't help this child. Finding out who it is, what happened, is more important than making other people feel falsely reassured."

And that is exactly what it would be: a false reassurance. Any person could cry over a corpse, but what good would crying do? What would change if she cried over them? Nothing. Everything she did was for the person in front of her, who they were and what they needed. They needed to be identified. They needed justice. They didn't need her tears.

~Q~

"Angela?" Poking her head into the artist's office, Brennan spotted her sitting rigidly on the sofa, her face turned deliberately to the window while Enya hummed and a piano softly strummed in the background. Brennan took herself more fully into the room, closing the door behind her.

"How can you say things like that?" She exploded the moment Brennan shut the door.

Brennan held herself tightly, feeling a constriction in her chest that might have been fear, or shame. "I wasn't trying to hurt you."

"You stood there talking about squirrels eating children. It's wrong!"

"It's reality," Brennan countered softly.

Bolting to her feet, Angela advanced toward Brennan with a mix of fury and revulsion. "Reality?! What world do you live in?"

"The natural world." Nature, red in tooth and claw. The law of the jungle. It's a dog-eat-dog world. How many clichés were there to describe exactly this: all creatures utilized whatever resources they could find to aid their survival. It was nothing personal, it just was. Only humans made it personal.

"_That's not natural!_" Angela felt herself becoming completely unhinged by Brennan's unnatural calm. That kid should be sitting in a class room, getting busted for chewing gum or not doing his homework. Murdered and left in a park and eaten by squirrels, that was not supposed to happen to a kid. Dying was not supposed to happen to a kid. Being calm and rational about a murdered kid was not supposed to be possible for any sane human being. Angela paced, wiped tears from her eyes. "I can't do this."

Brennan bit her lip, feeling the lachrymal fluid welling up in her own eyes. "I understand."

"No you don't!"

Angela turned, facing her friend and lashing out because unlike Brennan, she couldn't contain what she felt. Aside from eyes shining a bit brighter than normal, Brennan looked perfectly calm and composed and that was just inhuman. Wasn't it? "What is wrong with you? Why don't you cry?!"

It made her flinch, both the harshly asked demand and what it implied. Something was wrong with her, Brennan had always known that. But regardless of all that she was unable to say properly, the fact was that she _was _crying, right now. Angry at herself, Brennan dashed the escaping tear aside and braved the wrath of her best friend. Once again, the accusation of callousness hit her like a slap that she had to endure, stinging all the more because she'd thought Angela understood her.

But she didn't, and Zack didn't. And it hurt to be called cold.

"I can't see her when I'm crying," Brennan finally explained, wondering if Angela was happy to hear her voice shake. "She needs me to see her. I want to help her, and I can't do that if I start feeling it now."

"So you're saying you don't feel anything," Angela snarled. "Are you just a robot?" That had finally broken through the icy shell. Angela felt a measure of satisfaction to see Brennan heat up at last, to watch the passion start to bubble and pulse under her smooth, frozen surface.

"Of course I feel something." Her voice snagged, her head throbbed and scratched with barely understood whispers. "I feel anger, and sadness, and ... hatred for the person who did this. I feel hopeless that I can't change anything. I feel fear because I know it will happen again. But this is not productive. She needs me to focus on _her_, not on me. My feelings don't matter!"

They faced each other from a distance of only a few feet. Angela watched the emotions warring in Brennan's eyes but never spilling out onto her face. This was the image, the same image that she'd fleetingly thought of painting when Brennan had talked of Jemma's death. All that pain, grief, sorrow, and agonized anger, was swirling in her stormy grey eyes like a hurricane. Transfixed, Angela tried to figure out what had taken Brennan from passive to passionate in the space of one minute.

It was something she'd said that made Brennan hurt. It was something Booth said that Brennan wouldn't forgive. She'd been angry with Booth that day, when the storms raged over Jemma's death.

Suddenly Angela understood. Oh yes, it made sense to her now. Betrayal was what had released the pressure that night, and betrayal had done it again now. Any other time, Temperance Brennan throttled her feelings up so tightly they almost didn't exist. It was only the harsh pain of someone she trusted turning against her that broke that savage repression.

Remorse softened her immediately as what Brennan had said sank in. "Oh, God. I'm sorry, Sweetie. I'm so sorry."

Brennan shook her head, her composure slipping even further. "It doesn't matter."

It couldn't be good for her, thinking she had to keep her emotions so viciously contained. "Your feelings do matter. They matter."

"No they don't. The only thing that matters is helping her!" Her voice broke at last, a small sob shaking her as her throat pinched shut. Brennan turned and vanished before the tears fell.

~Q~

Limbo. Angela had renamed Modular Bone Storage the first week she'd worked at the Jeffersonian and quickly gained converts to the poetic moniker despite Brennan's insistence that poetry did not belong in a lab. As much as her clinical side believed in steel tables and clean tools, blue nitrile gloves and sterile procedures, she conceded to herself that night that the place of waiting was aptly named.

This little child was in limbo. Brennan had cleaned and macerated the remaining tissue on the skull after retrieving samples for the DC Medical Examiner. With a sand tray standing by, she carefully arranged the pieces and ensured a good fit before gluing each bit back into place. The mandible was mostly finished, which would make reassembling the rest easier. She could use the width of the mandible to help predict the placement of the facial bones.

The bones of the face are lightweight and fragile, especially the ethmoid, sphenoid, vomer and the maxilla. The light, airy bone made the entire skull weigh less, but in exchange for making it easier to carry one's head around, those delicate bones were easily crushed and broken. One or two hungry scavengers could do a great deal of damage in very little time. This child had been left out in the open, hastily buried under brush and leaves, which would make her invisible to the human eye but not to the nose of carrion eaters or insects.

It was a clandestine grave, a sure sign of a crime.

"This shouldn't have happened," Brennan finally told the skull. Maybe Angela had been right. It went against human nature to stay calm over the death of a child. Humans are programmed to protect their offspring, just as all animals are. It was a simple matter of species preservation, and killing the young of one's own species went against natural selection. A crime that worked against natural selection almost by definition had to be unnatural. So Angela was right.

Little bits of bone steadily reconnected with larger bits, and the skull slowly reemerged under Brennan's steady hands. She looked down into the mouth and nose taking shape, noting the maxilla flared forward quite extensively, whereas the emerging palate was hyperbolic. The nasal spine seemed small, the opening wide. "African American, perhaps?"

Large brown eyes, a shade darker than autumn leaves blinked up at her. Apple round cheeks, lips small and full. Skin the color of spiced cocoa.

~Q~

Brennan found Angela in her office the next morning and tensed when the first thing Angela said was an exasperated accusation, "You stayed all night."

That, of course, was obvious given Brennan was wearing the same clothing as yesterday. Without acknowledging Angela's statement, she silently handed over the skull, whole and bearing tissue depth markers.

"Are you not speaking to me now," Angela quipped.

Frowning, Brennan flicked her gaze from the reconstructed skull to her friend. "I finished the reconstruction," she said, knowing it was redundant and yet having nothing else to reassure Angela her silence wasn't deliberate. "Would you like to try the Angelator?"

Angela's computer program was up and running, just waiting for its first case.

Taking the skull gently, turning it, Angela's practiced eyes swept over the jigsaw planes, noting structure and the flaring upper teeth. "Sure. We can try it."

"She's African American. How soon do you think you can have her face?" Brennan asked.

"She?"

It took a long time for Brennan to meet Angela's gaze, because the slip couldn't be defended. Recalling their argument from the day before, however, made Brennan feel bolder. She lifted her chin almost defiantly and gestured. "The little girl."

Shaking her head in confusion, Angela studied the face she would reveal and wondered what Brennan saw. An African American girl. How could she tell? Even Angela knew that children's faces did not show sexual dimorphism until mid to late teens. Even in adults, there was only one reliable way to determine the sex of an individual. "I thought you said the pelvis doesn't show gender until after puberty."

Uncomfortable again, Brennan looked away and nodded her assent. "That is correct."

"Then how do you know this is a girl?"

"Statistically—"

"Bull shit," Angela interrupted rudely. "I call bull shit. You never rely on statistics for anything because there's an inherent uncertainty in numbers. You've said that yourself. You're saying this is a girl. How do you know?"

Brennan's jaw tightened, her eyes turning as hard as diamond. "I don't know."

She turned and walked out to begin examining the remaining bones. It took Angela a few minutes to realize she didn't quite understand what Brennan had meant: was she admitting she truly did not know the gender, or did she know it and could not understand how she knew.

In the end, Brennan was correct. The identification came through dental records a few hours later, confirming that the child in the park was indeed a little girl of African American ancestry.

"How did you know, Brennan?" Angela stood inside Brennan's office holding the x-rays Zack had shared with her. "Shakila Jackson, age 10. How did you know?"

Brennan lifted her shoulders helplessly. "I saw her."

~Q~

* * *

Scientific Note: Forensic details in this chapter are courtesy of articles compiled in Advances in Forensic Taphonomy: Method, Theory, and Archaeological Perspectives, Haglund, William D & Marcella H. Sorg, Edt. CRC Press, 2002.

All mistakes are mine.

Author's Note: I know I didn't give Hodgins much to go on, but that was because in these earliest episodes he was much less involved in dealing with the actual victim. I imagine that made it easier for him to insulate himself.

This was already a difficult topic to write when I was working on it last week (two days before the shootings). Since then I've edited it and added more to focus on how the different characters cope with the death of children. Somehow it went from painful to cathartic; hopefully you dear readers will find some small comfort here as well. The feelings we all have are 'normal,' even in their variation.


	5. Reading Between the Lines

Disclaimer: I am experimenting this time by not disclaiming anything. It's all just a meaningless ritual, right? :P

Author's Note: Having been possessed by this story, the ideas keep me awake at night until I write them down. It's a strange thing to be possessed or haunted, kind of like someone else has hijacked my mind. I must confess, I have no idea where this story is coming from but it insists on telling itself.

* * *

~Q~

~Reading Between the Lines~

~Q~

**My heart suspects more than mine eye can see.**

_Titus Andronicus, Act II, sc. 3_

~Q~

"How did you know, Brennan?" Angela stood inside Brennan's office holding the x-rays Zack had shared with her. "Shakila Jackson, age 10. How did you know?"

Brennan lifted her shoulders helplessly. "I saw her."

~Q~

Thinking over the unusually vague statement, the atypical insistence that she knew gender when it couldn't be determined from the bones, Angela felt a sensation of chilly fingertips walking over her skin. She advanced on Brennan, keeping watchful eyes steadily on her as she sank into a chair and leaned forward. The shivers continued for a full minute, seeming to get stronger as she went deeper into the room, closer to where Shakila Jackson's skull sat in Brennan's hands.

"You said once that I saw Jemma the way that you do," Angela began.

Rotating the skull slowly between her palms, Brennan's liquid gaze roved over the bones, her fingers sliding cautiously over the reconstructed curves and planes. Too busy listening to the touch of bone, too distracted by the crackling that sounded inside her own cranium and nearly drowned out Angela's statement, Brennan nodded once, briefly. Otherwise she did not pause or react in any way.

"How do you see them?"

Every skull had a face, features that seemed to float over the landmarks of bone. Always a nose would take its shape from the nasal opening tucked under the short nasal bone, and from those landmarks she would know its length and width. Eyebrows often emerged from the fine arc of the subraorbital margins. From the angle of the maxillae, Brennan could envision how the lips lay when relaxed, while the condition of the teeth suggested what kind of smile might be expected. The mandible's size and angles gave a jaw-line: narrow and sharp, or broad and robust, or something in between. The zygomatics formed cheeks that might be high or low, sharp or gentle, tucked in close or flaring outwards over the jaw. Given enough time, Brennan could always see a face.

Yet what Angela might want to know, was how Jemma had appeared to her. Jemma was one of the whisperers, and Shakila too. How did Shakila look? How did she whisper her secrets? Brennan wasn't sure how to describe any of it. "Like a painting," she finally replied. "I see everything, every color, as clearly as a painting."

She lifted her gaze at last, pinning Angela with that luminous gaze that had the power to freeze its recipient. Not defiance, not anger, just a directness that was utterly disarming. "What you drew for Jemma is what I saw, exactly. How do _you_ do it?"

"You won't believe it," Angela cautioned. "You'll insist that it's not possible."

Shakila drew Brennan's attention again, stopping the question that begged to be asked. Nothing was impossible, really. Staring down into the teeth, suddenly she realized there were horizontal lines in the incisors and canines, her adult teeth that had erupted since she was six years old. The two year and six year molars were smooth. Brennan's thumb stroked down the frontal incisor, feeling the ripples of uneven enamel. She looked into the empty ocular orbits, her own eyes widening with realization.

The scratching roared inside her head, staticky like a speaker with a shorted-out wire. Moments of clarity cut off into stark silence, then returning with a burst of white noise. Almost a word, almost a thought, nothing she could pinpoint. But the feeling she knew all too well.

Leaving the skull on her desk, Brennan shot out of her chair and darted past Angela, heading straight for the Bone Room.

"Where are you going?" Angela called after her. She glanced uneasily at the skull. "What did you say to her?"

Donning gloves and rushing to the end of the table where Shakila Jackson's bones were laid out in anatomical order, Brennan reached for a tibia and examined it carefully. How had she missed this earlier? Her fingers slid carefully across the proximal and distal ends, her eyes narrowed onto the faint lines she knew were there. She looked at the femur, the radius and ulna, without picking them up. The lines were there, she knew they would be there.

Brennan set down the tibia and rushed out into the lab proper, nearly knocking Angela over in the process. "Zack!"

"What's going on," Angela demanded.

"Zack!" Brennan called again, more urgently than Angela had ever heard before.

"Yes, Dr. Brennan," he answered with his usual calm, showing puzzlement at her flustered appearance.

"Did you x-ray Shakila Jackson's extremities?"

"Yes. I uploaded them about 30 minutes ago. Angela has the hard copies."

Brennan was at a computer terminal almost before he'd finished speaking. Calling up the x-rays for the long bones, she zoomed in on the areas of concern. The two tibias, side-by-side, spoke the truth. "There."

Zack approached the monitor curiously, taking in the ghostly white triangle that made the distal tibias look almost cone-shaped. White lines of varying widths warbled across both of the images like careless chalk marks. "Harris lines?"

On a ten year old child who lived in Washington DC in 2005, Harris lines bilaterally in all the long bones could only mean extremely poor health due to repeated infections, or severe neglect. "How did I not see this before," she muttered, clearly annoyed with herself. There were nine lines; nine times.

Angela stood in the doorway, growing ever more impatient. "Brennan. Explanation?"

"She has Harris lines. Nine instances of arrested bone growth. That, taken with the dental hypoplasia, suggests periods of extreme malnutrition lasting longer than ten days at a time."

Stunned, Angela gasped, "You mean she was starved?"

"Yes. Repeatedly during the last four years. The last time was around the time that she died." Brennan lifted a trembling finger to point out the last hazy lines that were thickly edging the epiphyseal plates.

They'd locked her in the dark and withheld food for over two weeks, maybe longer. Dark, hungry, cold. Brennan clutched at the monitor, knowing it was more than she could prove. As the color drained out of her face, her ears buzzed and she felt dizzy, nauseated. Sweat burst forth across her forehead and on her back, a sign of dangerously low blood pressure. The feeling of hunger burned in her belly, a hollow ache that felt far too familiar. But she couldn't prove it. She'd never be able to prove the darkness.

Angela was watching her like an exasperated mother. "When was the last time you ate?"

Still dazed and unsteady, she shook her head, realizing she had no idea. "I'll eat later."

"No, now. Come on." Reaching for her arm, Angela guided Brennan back to her office. "Grab your purse. We're going."

"Angela, I have to record—"

"Later," she insisted. "For now, you need to eat before you pass out."

Fifteen minutes later they were sitting in the museum's Fossil Café, only steps away from the "Early Mammal Fossils" exhibit and the throngs of mid-summer tourists wandering through. Angela noted Brennan's color was still off but she'd stopped shaking at least.

"What's going on, Brennan?"

"Nothing, I just got a little bit dizzy."

"You nearly fainted."

Brennan's usual resistance was making a rapid return now that she'd had some orange juice and started in on the lentil soup. "Orthostatic hypotension. It's a normal drop in blood pressure caused by standing up too quickly."

Taking another bite of the soup, Brennan avoided Angela's probing and directed her thoughts to how she would proceed next. But Angela wasn't going to let it go.

"When did you eat last?" she asked again.

"I don't know," Brennan sighed. She didn't. It might have been hours ago; it might have been the previous day. She'd been so focused on reassembling Shakila's skull and disturbed over the argument that time had passed in a blur and she didn't remember much of anything since the argument with Angela yesterday. Yesterday, right? Yes, maybe….

"You didn't go home last night. You haven't eaten. And the way you just ran out of your office, what was that? Brennan … did you see her ghost?"

The ridiculous question made her pause, the spoon suspended half way to her mouth. "What? Of course not! Why would you ask that?"

"Because you get this vague look in your eyes when the bones speak to you."

When Brennan was thrown off kilter, her lip curled up faintly which pushed her slender nose into a crinkle and that launched the deep furrow that inevitably appeared at the edge of one brow. It always came in stages, running from speechlessness to the effort of squinting harder at the object of her confusion. She was giving Angela that look now. "Bones do not have mouths."

"Call it whatever you want. You look at them, touch them, and then run off with a revelation every single time."

Brennan shrugged. "I am very observant."

Skepticism can run in two directions, Angela mused fondly. She couldn't resist a little tease, a nudge that might see Brennan opening herself to broader possibilities. "No way. Either you're psychic or you're in contact with their ghosts."

Despite her irritation at having her skills dismissed as the work of imaginary forces, a chill scampered over Brennan's back, making her flinch slightly. "Ghosts do not exist, Angela."

The stubborn set of her jaw would have dissuaded most people, but Angela Montenegro had learned enough about Brennan by now to keep pushing. "What did you see, then?"

"Interruptions of enamel deposition in the teeth. It's a classic archeological indicator of malnutrition. I realized that, if she was subjected to periods of malnutrition that would be evident in her teeth, those signs might appear in her bones as well because she's still a child."

"So, it's all science." Again, the tease.

Again the seeming obliviousness. "Yes."

And again, the steady, unblinking silver light of Brennan's gaze struck Angela mute … until she remembered why she'd gone to Brennan's office in the first place. "Your science was not able to be as certain about gender as you were."

Suddenly the soup recaptured her interest. Brennan scooped up another spoonful, pointedly ignoring Angela's acerbic observation.

"You said you saw her, then you asked me what I see. What if I told you I can see their ghosts, sometimes?"

"I'd say you were delusional," Brennan retorted.

Irritated, she snapped back. "You're the one who told me you see their faces in color, like a painting."

"At times, my imagination is very vivid," Brennan hedged. "But that's all that it is."

"What if it's more than that?"

Taking another sip of juice, giving it a full sixty seconds of thought, Brennan decided Angela needed to be reminded of the world they both lived in. "Ghost stories do not win murder convictions. The reports I write must stand up to peer review and cross examination from defense attorneys. Even if what you're suggesting were true—which it is not—I could not use ghosts as a basis for identification, or for any other conclusions I draw from the bones. Ghosts do not exist in courtrooms."

_They don't exist anywhere_, Brennan thought fiercely. _It's just some weird intuition that I can't explain, so... _She pinched her lips closed firmly, determined to ignore the suggestion that anything supernatural could be at play. As an empiricist and especially as a forensic scientist, only the tangible counted, only what she could prove.

"All right," Angela conceded quietly. Seeing the distant look still roaming in Brennan's eyes, worrying at the fact that the anthropologist hadn't eaten or slept in so long, she reached out to touch Brennan's arm. "Look, I want to apologize for yesterday."

"There's no need."

"Yes, there is. I basically accused you of being heartless."

Brennan dropped her chin, studying the fingers resting on her arm intently. "You're not the first one," she shrugged. It was supposed to sound nonchalant, a mere annoyance, but the painful injustice of it she couldn't fully hide.

"Who else," Angela asked softly.

"Peter. Agent Booth."

Recalling that Brennan would not speak to Booth because of something he'd said, she wondered if this was it. Calling her cold. Yet, she was still living with Peter (although that relationship was reaching an end, Angela suspected). And, Brennan was still talking to Angela. So, probably not that.

"I'm sorry," she said again. "I just … it's awful. Death, and suffering and the way these bodies look. It's disgusting. I don't know how you can do it. How do you not vomit?"

"Habituation. You get used to the smell of vomit after a while." _Especially if you're forced to lay in it for days._ Brennan blinked and shook her head, annoyed at the intrusive memory of her two days locked in the car trunk. It didn't matter now. "You can get used to anything if you're around it long enough."

"I don't want to get used to death." The soft plea, containing Angela's fear of losing her humanity, resonated between them.

"Then you should quit," Brennan suggested gently.

Shaking her head with a wry laugh, she disagreed with the sensibility of that plan. "If I quit, who's going to take care of you?"

"I don't need anyone to take care of me," Brennan scoffed.

"Says the woman who forgot to eat since yesterday...?"

A sigh, a slump of ordinarily erect posture. "Okay, point taken."

~Q~

When they returned to the lab, Special Agent Seeley Booth was impatiently pacing just outside Brennan's office. Angela raised a fascinated brow, recalling again that the man sure knew how to fill out a suit. She nudged Brennan forward gleefully. "Your boyfriend's back."

Shooting a scathing glare at Angela, Brennan grudgingly stepped forward and directed the same glare at Booth. "I told you I won't work with you."

"You don't have a choice, Bones."

He was just as beautiful as she remembered, if a man could be called beautiful. Perfect bone structure, and that lethal charm smile was gearing up to make a reappearance. Brennan flicked her eyes away just in the nick of time.

And just that quickly, he dropped the charm in favor of briskly annoyed professionalism. "Shakila Jackson is my case as of this morning. Missing child. Your assistant told me you've identified her."

"Yes." Grinding her teeth in frustration, she avoided his eyes and headed for the Bone Room, where the x-rays were still glowing on a computer monitor. "I also found cause of death."

Pointing out the chalky waves that crossed the landscape of Shakila's long bones, Brennan explained in clipped terms. "These are Harris lines. They indicate interruptions in bone growth. When present bilaterally on all the long bones as they are here, Harris lines are a sign of severe episodes of malnutrition. Similar striations in her incisors but not in her deciduous molars give a more specific range of the previous four years, but not before then. Whoever she's been living with in the last four years subjected her to repeated incidences of starvation lasting at minimum 10-14 days at a time."

Booth was looking at her. Brennan felt his eyes roving over her face, sweeping over her entire frame, and the part of her that remembered what it was like to kiss him flushed in anticipation. The part of her that recalled how deeply he could wound her froze her to a complete halt. Indecision and passivity was not her usual mode, so why did she feel compelled to wait for Booth's response?

When his attention left her to return to the computer, Brennan breathed a little easier. But then he was laughing, a low dismissive sound, and her breath gusted outwards in a puff of outrage.

"You're saying her mother starved her to death because of some lines on an x-ray?"

Braving his direct gaze at last because none of the earlier attraction was there now that he'd laughed at her, she relished the power her anger had infused into her. What had she ever seen in this arrogant 'cop' who refused to see what was right in front of his eyes? "Apparently I wasn't wrong about you. Try and solve this murder without me, then. Go ahead."

Taking a step towards her, Booth glowered. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I means I don't need to stand here in my lab and listen to you discard the evidence because you're too ignorant to understand it."

She heard his mouth open in affronted shock as she shoved past him but didn't bother to look back.

"Zack!" Her grad student was loitering in the doorway. "Get Agent Booth what he needs and get him out of here. Then leave instructions with security to never let him into this lab unaccompanied again."

~Q~

Angela found Brennan sitting in the loft four hours later, still holding Shakila's skull, still staring down into it while her eyes shimmered with tears that would never fall. Her lips moved, something too private for Angela to hear passing between Brennan and the remnant of a lost little girl. Observing the scene long enough that she finally had to shift her weight, she revealed her presence in the movement and Brennan pulled sharply back into herself whatever feelings she had been surrounding herself in.

"I don't understand you," Angela finally admitted, but with a tenderness that belied the harsh words. "You can look at a disgusting, decaying body like it's just another rock or something. You're as cold as ice about it. But then you drive yourself to the point of exhaustion, not eating, not sleeping. And afterwards, you're like this..." She gestured, making it clear what she'd seen.

She bit her lip, sighing, and turned her face to Angela. Was there any way to explain that didn't make her sound morbid or mentally deranged? "She was in the dark, and hungry, scared and alone. I know what she felt. I can feel it. I'm there with her in the dark."

"God, Brennan, don't do this to yourself."

"I'm not," she insisted. "It's already done."

The puzzled silence drifted hazily, unwilling to be broken and unable to sustain itself.

"My parents disappeared when I was fifteen..."

The rest of the story had Angela in tears right along with her.

~Q~

* * *

Scientific Note: Harris lines are invisible to the naked eye but show up as bright white lines on x-rays. Forensic details were verified from Human Osteology, as previously cited. And from Skeletal Trauma: Identification of Injuries Resulting from Human Rights Abuse and Armed Conflict; Kimmerle, Erin H. and Jose Pablo Braybar, etd.; CRC Press, 2008. All mistakes are mine.

Author's Note: In the Pilot episode, Booth told Cullen Brennan had previously given Booth cause of death and the killer from x-rays, and he didn't believe her. Here it is, one possible interpretation. I'll leave the question of Booth's success without Brennan to your imaginations. He's excellent with people and easily able to get confessions in the interrogation room. But then again, he did work pretty hard to get Brennan back on his side. So, it's up for grabs. Either way, only Booth knows... ;)

Because of the holidays, it might be close to a week before I can update again. Until then, Happy Holidays to everyone! :D


	6. The Boy in the Well

Disclaimer: Still don't own the character of Temperance Brennan.

Author's Note: This chapter deals with genocide, including a forensic description of injuries. It is not graphic, but the implication of violence is there.

This is also the last chapter that is Booth-lite. After this we'll be seeing much more of him. Meanwhile, how does Brennan interact with a skull when there's no one looking...?

* * *

~Q~

~The Boy in the Well~

~Q~

**"I have heard (but not believ'd) the spirits of the dead  
May walk again."**

_The Winter's Tale, Act III, Scene 3_

~Q~

**Near Plan de Sanchez, Guatemala  
August 2005**

"We found another one."

Under the tarpaulin that had been erected to hold back at least some of the rain, these Spanish words drifted across the humid air pressing down on Brennan and made her pause. She was kneeling on a plank that had begun to warp from the combined assault of moisture and her weight, leaning slightly to her right to get the best angle while she visually inspected the scattering of bones the team had uncovered yesterday. Setting down her inventory sheet and video camera, she slowly stood and arched her aching back. "Where?"

"A well, about half a kilometer from here. The villagers say they remember a boy was thrown in there, and maybe some others." Miguel paused. "When they heard what is happening here, they took him out themselves. They want someone to come look at him."

It was the rainy season now. The combination of steamy heat and pattering rain had plastered Dr. Temperance Brennan's hair to her head and her shirt to her back. She lifted a wrist to try and sweep slick wet tendrils of hair out of her face, and winced with annoyance at the smear of mud she left behind in its place. She spoke in fluent Spanish. "Can Dr. Levy go?"

"No, he's talking with the local militia leader. And, I was hoping you could go, Dr. Brennan. The women … they will trust you." Miguel was short, sturdy, with a rounded face and square hands. He acted as a translator and liaison between the smaller, Mayan villages and the forensic team organized by Human Rights Watch. Because this excavation was barely tolerated by the local governor, Dr. Levy had to spend a lot of time smoothing ruffled feathers. He was well-suited to the job; Brennan most definitely was not.

Looking over the series of trenches she'd been working today, she considered her options. The seven trenches raked over the surface of the earth, each one a meter deep and 30 meters long. Her plank was straddling the edge of the third trench, where the first set of bones had appeared. Getting into a grave would compromise the context and risked destroying evidence, but laying on a plank next to the grave offered a practical way to get close and preserve the integrity of the site. So far Brennan was certain there were two separate individuals here, and probably more. They'd only just begun to uncover the estimated 95 victims buried at this site. But now there was another grave, a smaller one, and people who'd cared enough to open it themselves.

And in doing so, they'd already compromised much of the precious context that Brennan was so carefully documenting here at this larger site. Context was the entirety of a grave, every particle of dirt and debris, of clothing and personal effects, not just the items themselves but where and how they ended up in the grave. Position and timing could tell the story of what happened, but once evidence was moved, the story it could tell vanished into the mists. If someone experienced didn't get to the village to protect what remained of the evidence, the boy those villagers cared about might never be named or receive the justice they so clearly desired for him.

Making up her mind, Brennan looked around for someone to take over inventory. They were still at the first stage of the excavation here in the third trench: documenting the scene, counting and classifying bones and personal artifacts, carefully photographing the grave as each layer was peeled back. Everything had to be recorded and mapped on the inventory sheet so an individual's body parts and personal effects would be kept together as much as possible. She spotted one of the graduate students walking past, probably coming from the mess tent, and called out to him. "Justin!"

The young man changed trajectory, trotting over to her. "Yes, Dr. Brennan?"

"Apparently there's another grave nearby. I'm going to go with Miguel and check it out."

Justin looked surprised, then concerned. His eyes flickered over to Miguel before returning to hers. "Do you think it's safe?"

Brennan nodded. "I'll have Miguel with me. I need you here to help with the inventory. A lot of the remains are fragmented, some are burnt. Right now we're looking for the minimum number of individuals. We're dividing the long bones into three units, and we're looking for at least two out of three units present before we consider it a single individual. Also note any cranial vaults, maxilla, mandibles, and of course the ilium, ischium and pubis."

The younger man nodded solemnly. "You going now?"

Turning back to Miguel, Brennan asked, "By car or by foot?"

Miguel sent her a bemused, what-do-you-think glance. "No roads to Chichupaxal ."

Brennan sighed. "Then yes, I guess I'm going now—it's a long walk. Hopefully we'll be back by dusk. Tell Dr. Levy where I've gone when you see him." Glancing at Miguel, she added, "Give me a couple of minutes to grab my bag."

Back in the tent she shared with two other women, Brennan took stock of her condition. Her cargo pants were covered in muck, pockets bulging with brushes, tape measure, mechanical pencils and a few tiny notepads. Her formerly white button-down shirt didn't look much better, she knew. Working in mud during the rainy season made fastidiousness difficult. It didn't matter much anyway, other than for hygiene. Certainly, there was no one to impress here in the killing fields. She was here to work and the dead never cared for appearances.

Grabbing her canvas tool bag, some trail mix and two bottles of water, Brennan returned to find Miguel and an armed militia officer who would be joining their small expedition. They set off to the east.

Walking through the nearly trackless jungle was taxing, especially when heat, rain and voracious insects were added to the experience. Brennan had long ago learned to endure the biting swarms. Quinine and inoculations against various tropical, insect-borne diseases were the only real defense. Lightly stepping over fallen branches, clumps of vegetation, pushing aside draping vines, and splashing through puddles and streams, she made sure she kept pace with her male escorts.

Though she never asked him to, Miguel paused every now and then to let her catch up. He silently admired the American woman's stoic presence behind him. She never slowed down, never complained, and never once slapped at a mosquito. It was the second reason he'd asked for her rather than Dr. Levy. The older anthropologist would have spent the entire two hour trek whining and fussing over the discomforts of life in the Mayan jungles. Dr. Brennan was both better looking and better equipped for hardship.

What had brought her to Guatemala was a combination of stress from breaking up with Peter and a sudden urgency in documenting the Guatemalan genocide because of a recent International Criminal Court ruling. An international court case in April 2004 finally decreed that the government of Guatemala was responsible for acts of genocide against Mayan villagers in 1982/1983, and that further investigations and trials should proceed. The area had been investigated before, but of 24 known mass graves, only 9 had been excavated so far, yielding a little over 100 victims. At least 7 other villages were also subjected to massacres and not all of them had been excavated either.

When Brennan got the call to join a second expedition to recover additional remains that had been missed previously, Peter's hostile exit from her life made the offer an attractive one.

They arrived at Chichupaxal around 11 am. Miguel guided Brennan to a small hut on the fringe of the village. She waited outside for a few minutes while he spoke to an elderly woman a few feet away in the soft and musical Mayan dialect. When he returned to Brennan with the older woman in tow, he gestured to the door. "In there."

Brennan nodded. She pulled a pair of blue nitrile gloves out of a pocket of her bag. "Can you ask her the background? Any witnesses? Any idea who the victim might be?"

Miguel spoke to the old woman again. After a few more exchanges, he reported back to Brennan. "She says it happened during the dry season in 1983. Soldiers came. They had a Mayan boy with them that they called Mario. He was about 12 years old. That night the villagers heard him screaming, then yelling among the soldiers. The leader shot him in the head and threw him in there." Miguel gestured to the well standing about 15 meters away.

"Okay." Brennan stood very still for a moment, fixing the circumstances in her mind. Boy, far too young for such a terrible death. Mistreated extensively, no doubt. It had been the routine to torture children and women viciously, and then leave them to die alone of their wounds. Shot in the head meant an instant end—and possibly the only mercy the boy had been given. Now it was Brennan's task to find whatever evidence of the crime against this child remained, to seek what justice might still be possible. If nothing else, his name would be remembered.

Turning, she pushed open the door and entered the small shack. Inside it was bare cement block walls, a hardpan floor, no windows. Memory of El Salvador slashed through her mind, scraping her raw until it was all she could do to remain standing still. The desire to get back into the open nearly defeated the pull of what sat in this room and distinguished it from that other one.

In the center was a single table piled with mud-caked bones. Brennan stepped to the table and started pulling out the tools she was going to need. "Is there any way we can get some lanterns in here…?"

~Q~

It had taken several hours to clean as much mud off the bones as possible but once that was finished, they were laid out in anatomical order on the table. Small vials containing samples of the soil that had clung to the remains were lined up next to her work bag, waiting for twin samples Miguel had been dispatched to recover from the depth of the well.

Taking her first close look at the heavily stained skull and bones laid out so carefully, Brennan found herself gazing into a face that seemed to float just slightly over the skull. She blinked in astonishment, startled by the softly rounded cheeks and sloping forehead of a not-quite adolescent boy who clearly looked Mayan. Young. Sad. And moving his lips in speech. Squeezing her own eyes shut and shaking her head, Brennan looked again and saw a skull. Only a skull.

_I need water_, she scolded herself. It was extremely hot in here under the corrugated tin roof and dehydration could cause all sorts of trouble. She took a moment to step around the table and gulp down four healthy swigs of water before returning to her task.

Brennan spoke into her micro-recorder, cataloging her findings. "13 August 2005, 15:37 hours. Dr. Temperance Brennan of the Jeffersonian Institution conducting preliminary examination of exhumed human remains. Location is Chichupaxal, a small village located approximately ½ kilometer due east from the mass grave at Plan de Sanchez, Guatemala. Context of this find, according to witnesses, is a young male shot and deposited in a well in late 1983. A complete set of disarticulated human remains were recovered today by members of the village. Preliminary assessment of pelvic outlet suggests victim is male, however this is not conclusive. Fusion of secondary ossification centers of the long bones indicates age corresponding to 10-13 years. Partial eruption of secondary molars further narrows age to 11-12 years. Femoral length indicates victim was approximately 1.45 meters tall."

She shifted back to the skull, lifting it to examine the flares and curves that would suggest a face. "A robust zygomatic, coupled with the angled zygomaticmaxillary suture, the straight palatine suture, and a medium nasal spine are all consistent with Native American ancestry. I am confident in stating the remains recovered do in fact correspond to the victim described to me as a 12 year old Mayan male."

There it was again, the sweetly featured face of a boy Brennan knew she'd never seen before. The lips pursed and popped before the entire face faded out. _"Stabbed."_ Whispery like rustling leaves, the idea shimmered as an almost thought. Not really a thought, more like a dream; or something somebody else once said just slightly out of earshot but somehow she'd heard it anyway.

Brennan paused her recorder and felt chilled despite the heat, yet she leaned closer and studied the texture of the bones. Something was reminding her to look for evidence of a stabbing. Stabbing and impalement had been common during the genocide; if this boy had been stabbed, there might be marks left behind. She paid special attention to the ribs and sternum, and found gouging marks notching the third and fourth left costals. The width and depth of the grooved marks was hauntingly familiar, the unmistakable marks of a machete. Brennan had seen such marks before, in Rwanda and in previous sites in Central America. The hard-working tool of agriculture and land-clearing in the tropical regions unfortunately made an effective and readily-available weapon.

"They stabbed you. When did they stab you?" _Who am I talking to_, Brennan wondered vaguely. As she peered closer in the dim lantern light, she saw evidence of reactive bone formation, a sign that healing had begun.

She glanced again at the skull, uneasy. It was empty, the eye sockets dark, the teeth stained by decades in a muddy well. The bullet that had ended his life had left a small round hole in the frontal bone, 4 cm medial to the right sphenalfrontal suture and 8 cm anterior to the coronal suture. Directly above the right eyebrow, angling downward as if he'd been kneeling. The shot exited the occiputal, near the foramen magnum; a fatal path that would have destroyed his brain stem instantly.

"How long before they shot you?" How long had he lived with the pain before the mercy of a head shot ended his suffering? What else had been done to him?

A buzzing sounded in her head, a wash of dizziness. It was too hot in here, too dark, the walls closing in. Stone walls, circular, close, hot and humid, wet black mud closing over her. Buried alive, trapped in the dark. Brennan gasped, stumbling back and dropping her micro-recorder. She lurched for the open door, spilling herself out of the too small work space and bending over.

El Salvador. Car trunks. Wells. Men... _It's always men who lock us up._

Taking five deep breaths, she sank down onto the ground outside and placed her head over her knees. An old woman was walking toward her, clad in a brilliantly woven shawl. "Tiene hambre, doctora?" Are you hungry, she wanted to know.

"I … Si. Si, gracias. Un poco." Nodding, she agreed hunger might be the problem. Maybe a little. And being in the small, dark room after having been trapped in the dark herself so recently, so distantly. And hating men for the moment. Brennan slowly stood, glancing uneasily at the bones laying abandoned.

The older woman paused, taking in Brennan's distress and the silent bones beyond. "El nino no debe estar solo."

"No," Brennan sighed. She knew she couldn't leave evidence unattended even for a minute.

But the older woman seemed to have an entirely different reason in mind. She slowly crossed herself, eyeing the bones cautiously. "Su fantasma está aquí."

"Los fantasmas no existen," Brennan replied automatically, having neither the time nor the patience to start debating the possibility of ghosts. Then realizing she must sound too harsh, she added an apology. "Lo siento."

The woman smiled broadly and nodded, and even Temperance Brennan could tell she was being humored. Shaking her head, feeling better at any rate, she waved her companion off and returned to the boy inside the hut.

It was still stifling and humid in the small space. Taking in more water, Brennan helped herself to some of the trail mix she'd brought and studied the bones from a distance. The stabbing had happened at least a few days before the shooting. Another double handful of nuts and dried fruits, another swig of water. Then she returned to Mario and picked up her fallen recorder.

"What else happened to you?" She didn't know why she was speaking out loud, and suddenly felt uneasy at the prospect of finding out. The skull was still, silent, ghostly pale in the lantern light. She didn't expect it to answer her, and couldn't quite explain to herself why she'd spoken to it. Yet, as irrational as it seemed, as insane as she knew the notion was, Brennan felt compelled to break the cloying silence with words.

"You were Mayan, so you didn't speak English," Brennan declared. "Maybe some Spanish. I don't know why I'm speaking English to you. I'm not—I'm speaking to myself. Of course."

She shook her head and started the recorder. Briskly, Brennan described the location of the single gunshot wound to the skull, including the victim's likely position. Next she described the stab wounds and as the detached medical terms flowed smoothly out of her mouth, her eyes moved slowly over the bones.

It scraped against her mind, a leathery sound that commanded her to look down. Brennan moved her gaze down lower, again feeling almost compelled by arcane knowledge that she couldn't justify. She found another notch gouged into anterior portion of the sacrum. The angle suggested … impalement. Feeling nauseated, Brennan drew another slow breath, then closed her eyes. She opened them slowly, cutting her gaze back to the skull. The face was back, lips moving.

"I can't do this if I'm thinking of you. I can't let myself see you."

_They're just bones, _she reminded herself. _Unfeeling, nonliving, unknowing bones. No name, not a boy, not anything. Just remains._

She bent back to the notch, describing it and what had caused it with clipped, clinical terminology. The large words obscured the more painful and intimate sense of what had been done to Mario. When she had to decide whether to go beyond what she could prove, or to stick with the empirical evidence that existed on the bones, Brennan hesitated. A sting of tears made her blink her eyes and flinch away from the damage that would have been visible in flesh but never in bone.

"I can't prove that, but I know that it happened. I can only record the evidence that remains in front of me." She swallowed heavily, using her arm to dash a tear away.

_I only see what's in front of me._ Repeating the idea like a mantra, Brennan set her sights on the arms and legs. Moving efficiently over the rest of the skeleton, Brennan finished describing the injuries from falling down the well. Then she moved on to the remnants of clothing and a small religious medallion the boy had probably worn. When everything had been recorded she stopped, looking again at the face.

"You would have been in terrible pain. Maybe that's why they argued, why the leader shot you." Brennan shook her head at the atypical speculation, but offered one last bit of comfort to a boy who hadn't received enough compassion in his short life. "I won't leave you alone." Twenty two years alone at the bottom of a well was alone far too long already.

She had intended to ensure Mario was returned to his family for a proper burial, but his family had probably vanished during the genocide. No one in the village today knew who the boy had been or where he'd come from, only that the soldiers had brought him with them from somewhere else and killed him.

When Brennan returned to the United States a few weeks later, she was arrested by a Homeland Security Agent who had demanded to check the interior of her messenger bag. It was Mario's skull who peeked back at him, Mario who watched dispassionately while Brennan was questioned, Mario who Seeley Booth told her to grab so they could 'vamoose.' (Maybe Mario even rolled the ghosts of his eyes at the mangled mispronunciation, just as Brennan did.)

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: The village of Chichupaxal is fictional, although the name bears some resemblance to a real village in Guatemala. The events described here, unfortunately, are based on real history, including the injuries Brennan documents.

Like Brennan, I look for patterns. Here's a pattern I detected: Hart Hanson wrote the Pilot episode, wherein Brennan had a skull in her bag when she came back from Guatemala. Hart Hanson wrote episode 100, wherein Brennan carried Jemma's skull in her bag. Hart Hanson wrote episode 150, wherein Brennan took a skull home and talked to it.

Explanation? A) Hart Hanson has a morbid fascination with the idea of a woman carrying a skull around in her purse. B) What I'm writing in this story... :)

And last, methods of excavating a suspected mass grave, documenting it, and determining the minimum number of individuals are courtesy of Mass Graves and the Collection of Forensic Evidence: Genocide, War Crimes, and Crimes Against Humanity, by Stefan Schmitt. All mistakes are mine.


	7. The Intern in the Pond

Author's Note: You've seen who Brennan was before she met Angela. You're seeing the small ways that knowing Angela is changing her. Now brace yourself for the power of one very unforgettable man who is going to change absolutely everything.

Thank you to all of my readers and I hope you all have a very happy and healthy 2013.

* * *

~Q~

~The Intern in the Pond~

~Q~

**O, answer me:  
Let me not burst in ignorance! but tell,  
Why thy canoniz'd bones, hears'd in death,  
Have burst their cerements! why the sepulchre,  
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn'd.  
Hath op'd his ponderous and marble jaws,  
To cast thee up again.**

_Hamlet, Act I, scene 4_

~Q~

"Why is Zack here," she finally asked him.

After determining there was indeed a skeleton in the pond at Arlington, Brennan had regained the shore with Special Agent Seeley Booth and disdained the chivalrous hand he'd offered as she clambered out of the boat. Once ashore, she'd taken in both the Jeffersonian's Medico-Legal forensic truck and her assistant standing by, then cut a sharply accusing glare at Booth. The false rescue, his concession to her, and the truce they'd sworn did not blunt her irritation at his presumption.

At least he didn't pretend to misunderstand why Brennan might be annoyed to find her own graduate student had been summoned without her input. "I got in touch with Dr. Goodman and informed him we had skeletal remains at Arlington National Cemetery. He sent Zack and the truck straight over because you were still on the plane."

"When?" she demanded, trying to understanding his motive via his timing.

"When what?" Booth avoided her eyes suspiciously.

Brennan stepped closer, directly into his space. "When did you put in the hold for questioning order?"

Letting out a small confessional hiss, he allowed one of those angelic grins in evident hope that it would soften her up. "Right after I got off the phone with Goodman."

That damn charm smile was not going to work on her this time. "Don't even try it," she snapped and stormed off.

They avoided each other as much as possible. It was made easier by the fact that Brennan didn't mind getting dirty, whereas Booth's fastidiousness kept him well away from the muddy waters. She hastily dressed in a water-proof Tyvek coverall and gumboots and plunged into the water to document the context as much as possible. As she pushed deeper into the murky pond, slogging through waist-deep water, she darted a coy little grin back in Booth's direction. "Aren't you coming in for a swim, Agent Booth? I'm sure there's a suit in the truck that will fit you."

His eyes sparked and an echoing smirk curled one lip. "So you can drown me? No thanks, Dr. Brennan."

"'Such antics do not amount to a man,'" she offered with a shake of her head, and turned back to her work in triumph when he scowled.

The retrieval was slow, hours rolling by with nothing but a damp chill and stale, bitter coffee from the truck's overtaxed coffee urns to sustain her. As night fell, Brennan knelt under floodlights while the components of the body were brought to her piece by piece. Some of the bones were still articulated by sinewy ligaments. She assembled them in order, studying what landmarks she could see so far. What she felt, shivering in the night's cool air, was that something vital was missing.

The bones cried out for completion, restoration.

All that remained of the skull was a sizable chunk of the occipital and one edge of a temporal. The rest were retrieved from the pond in tiny shards, like a shattered vase. They crackled and squeaked when she touched them, vibrating with outrage at the injustice they'd suffered.

"What can you tell me?" Booth asked, finally daring to approach her once the retrieval technicians had declared their job finished.

"Not much. She's a young woman, probably between 18 and 22, approximately 5 foot 3. Race unknown. Delicate features."

"That's all?" Was that sarcasm? What did that tone mean? Was he expecting more based on what she'd given him before: a life story that might include hobbies, place of birth, maybe even a social security number. The first time, he'd been surprised and impressed by what Brennan could tell him. Or maybe he was surprised this time as well. But the second time he'd laughed and dismissed her conclusions as so much fiction. Even if her attention wasn't funneled onto the bones at hand, reading Booth was a daunting challenge.

So she shrugged, unable to perform miracles like correctly reading Booth on demand. Reading bones took experience and patience, but that was something she could do, and there was one other detail she could share. "Tennis player."

He was scoffing again. "How do you get a pretty tennis player out of that yuck?"

"Epiphysis fusion gives age, pelvic bone shape gives sex."

It was Zack who answered, because Brennan was grinding her teeth together and debating whether or not to acknowledge the idiotic question, not to mention the insult to the young woman who hadn't wanted to be murdered and disappeared into the depths of a pond. She knew what Booth was after, the 'junk that will convince a jury.' Finally the professor in her won, always on the lookout for a teaching opportunity. Even if Booth didn't pay attention, Zack was her student, so Brennan leaned forward to swipe away more of the mud that clung to the proximal humerus. "Bursitis in the shoulder. In somebody this young it must be an athletic injury."

"When did she die?"

"Eh…" It was a verbal shrug. The bones didn't know that.

"Ehh?" he sneered. "What does that even mean?"

Brennan scowled at the bones, growing increasingly annoyed with Booth and his contemptuous attitude.

Zack was snapping close-up photos. Again, he sensed Brennan's rising temper and intervened. "It means, let our bug and slime guy take a look."

"No clothing," Professor Brennan remarked to Booth, giving a more definite answer to the question of how long. No clothing suggested this woman had been in the pond for more than a few months. Cotton and linen clothing disintegrated at a somewhat predictable and very rapid rate, often leaving nothing but plastic and metal findings behind, such as rivets, zippers and buttons. A pair of jeans could completely vanish within 60-90 days in the right environment. In a pond, they might have lasted a bit longer. But of course, she should have realized he would not understand the significance.

Because Agent Booth started speculating. "Well, in my line of work, no clothes usually means a sex crime."

_This isn't your line of work_, she thought irritably. He was barking up the wrong branch, exactly why he needed to listen if he wanted this murder solved. Tartly, she corrected him. "In my line of work, it can also mean the victim favored natural fibers."

Brushing past Booth, Zack dug in an intentional slight. "Your suit, for example, will outlast your body by decades."

The polyester in a cheap business suit would not decay for decades because it was plastic, which made it unpalatable to microorganisms. That's what Zack meant, though Brennan knew Booth was currently wearing an expensive woolen blend. Zack's cryptic comment was an implication of cheapness, bad taste, poor judgement; but Booth's befuddled stare meant he hadn't caught on to the insult yet. Once he did realize it, he would be angry.

Standing, Brennan issued instructions on what evidence she would take custody of, and what she would leave to the FBI's criminalistics lab. It was late (or rather it was early morning), she was tired, and she hoped Agent Booth would back off and go back to the FBI with the plastic sheeting and chicken wire. Before he realized Zack had insulted him.

~Q~

Brennan slipped into her office as soon as she returned to the Jeffersonian. Carefully, she removed Mario's skull and set him on a shelf near her desk. It wasn't ideal, but there would be light and people nearby. "At least you aren't alone any more," she reassured him.

"Who are you talking to?" Angela inquired from the doorway.

Brennan turned sharply away from the skull and sighed. "Just talking to myself, thinking I'm glad to be back."

Angela quirked a brow, glancing from the skull to Brennan, who clearly had no intention of admitting she was talking to an inanimate object. Time to change the topic, and there was another very juicy one beckoning. "So, how did you go from being arrested by Homeland Security to spending all night at a crime scene with Agent Booth?"

A wry twist of her lips and flick of her wrist sent off the simple answer. "Booth."

"Booth?"

"He's the one who had me arrested."

"Oh." After a pause, she suddenly lit up with understanding. Angela's grin was infectious. "Oh... That was inspired. Kind of hot, if you ask me."

"Being arrested is not hot," Brennan protested.

"Having a man go to that much trouble to be with you? Definitely hot."

She shook her head, frustrated and too tired to dance to Angela's music. "He wanted me to check out a body in a pond. Show me the romance there...?"

"He could have settled for Zack, but went out of his way for you. That is the romance."

"I'm the best," Brennan countered impatiently. "And Booth is smart enough to go after the best. That is not romance, it's logic."

They stood squared off, always connected and always at odds. Angela laughed joyfully and folded Brennan in a welcoming hug. "Someday you're going to see the living as well as you see the dead."

"I missed you, too" Brennan confessed with her own brilliant smile.

~Q~

After catching up with her coworkers on projects, paperwork and emails that were left in limbo during her two months in Guatemala, Brennan finally received the cleaned pieces of the skull just as everyone else was preparing to leave for the evening.

Angela lingered at the edge of the table. "Did you get any sleep last night?"

"A couple of hours in my office this morning after I met with Goodman."

"You're going to sleep tonight, though. Right?"

Brennan flicked her gaze up, wearing a smirk. "Yes, Mom. Once I get the skull put back together."

The artist sighed, taking in the shattered bits. It would take Brennan all night, but she knew better than to try and dissuade her. "What do you think happened to her?"

This kind of damage had come deliberately, judging by the completion of the rest of the skeleton. Though she did not routinely speculate, Brennan knew there was only one cause for destruction like this. "Someone doesn't want us to identify her."

Angela squeezed Brennan's shoulder affectionately and then left.

"But I'll put you back together," Brennan assured the anonymous bits of bone.

She spread the pieces out, feeling their texture and heft to help her determine what type of bone. The slightly curved flat bones of the cranium went to the outer edges, and the lightweight, pumice-like facial bones were drawn in closer. Music played softly in the background, the night passed in a blur. Brennan fitted and discarded, searched and fitted and glued, all the night through. Zack had counted the bone shards and recorded their number: 947 pieces of the three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle.

Brennan saw a face waver over the half-completed right maxilla and orbital. Sorrowful brown eyes, full lips, high cheeks, creamy mocha skin. Familiarity rustled through Brennan's mind, a shock of recognition that was most astonishingly rare. This beautiful face had been erased, her head destroyed. _Find me_, the bones seemed to sigh. Or maybe it was the Jeffersonian's HVAC system churning into life to circulate the air.

"I know who you are," Brennan realized with surprise. Because she had seen this face before.

When the skull was complete, Brennan set her head on her arms and closed her eyes for a few minutes. Two nights without sleep had finally caught up to her and she didn't wake until Zack set a cup of coffee in front of her two hours later.

~Q~

They began the moment she entered Angela's office. Booth's disapproving smirk caught her as she walked past, noting her tardiness without knowing the cause. Brennan self-consciously brushed her still-damp hair aside, torn between justifying herself and letting him think whatever he pleased about her working hours. If he thought she routinely stumbled into work at 11 am, what did she care?

"Does Booth know how this works," she asked instead.

Angela explained the concept behind the machine she'd dubbed the "Angelator," and at Brennan's nod she powered up the projector.

The bony features had strongly suggested African American heritage, so Brennan had placed the tissue depth markers with that in mind. Angela ran the reconstruction program, her attention split between Brennan's intensity and Booth's skepticism. Booth, she noticed, kept darting small glances at Brennan, as if he were trying to figure her out. But Brennan had eyes only for Angela's work.

A dark face appeared in the projector, floating translucently over the bones that served as its foundation. Brennan frowned, tilting her head. She glanced back at the skull resting on Angela's desk, resisting the lure to go over and touch it while Booth was standing there. In her mind's eye, she recalled the familiar face she had envisioned the night before. No, this face Angela had created wasn't right.

"Run Caucasian values," Brennan instructed.

Booth was still watching her, not the reconstruction. Brennan ignored him, waiting for Angela to finish typing in a revised, standard set of Caucasian measurements. The skin brightened, the nose narrowed, lips shrank. Brennan frowned, studying the face. It looked closer. They might be able to recognize her now, so she asked.

"Does she look familiar to anyone?"

She'd asked the general room, but there was only one person who she expected to answer. She and Angela traded glances. Angela tipped her head in a nod, as if agreeing to an unspoken question. Brennan told her, "Split the difference: mixed race."

"Lenny Kravitz or Vanessa Williams," Angela asked airily, as if it mattered.

"I don't know what that means," Brennan replied absently. She was still tracking the face as Angela altered it yet again.

Angela shrugged, knowing already which option would produce the correct result. She tweaked the variables, and the face shimmered. The features returned almost half way to the African American states, but slightly more on the Vanessa Williams side of things. Slightly more Caucasian than African.

With that face floating in the holographic projector Brennan studied it intensely. Still not quite right. "Reduce tissue depths over the cheeks to the jawline."

Once that was done, the face slimmed down and it was right. This was it. She glanced again at Angela pointedly, expecting Angela's affinity for pop culture to assert itself at any moment. "Does anyone recognize her?"

Zack made a noise, the start of something tickling his memory. But as expected, it was Angela who spoke up, the familiar face striking her on more than one level. She stared at the young woman and felt surprise overtake her, because she realized Brennan expected her to actually know who this was, to know her name. And she did... "Is that who I think it is?"

Zack's memory kicked in also, making him be the one to ask if she was the girl who worked for a senator and went missing. Brennan felt absolved of the guilt from having remembered this face from the news, but not the young woman's name.

The name was provided by a stunned Seeley Booth, who surprised them all by admitting he knew exactly who it was: Cleo Louise Eller…. Her disappearance was one of his unsolved cases. It was his job to find her.

"Congratulations on your success," Hodgins muttered.

_Cleo,_ Brennan thought sadly. _We found you. _Now came the more difficult task of figuring out who had wanted her hidden.

~Q~

An hour later, Booth glanced from the holographic projection Angela had printed out for him to the photo he had on file. Then he looked at Brennan curiously, noting this was the second time she and Angela had worked together and given him a face that seemed more like a portrait than an approximation. Brennan had started asking if the others recognized Cleo long before anyone else, almost as if she'd known ahead of time whose skull she'd been handling.

"How did you recognize her before she even had her own face?" She had. He was absolutely certain that Brennan had entered Angela's office already knowing who they were going to see.

Brennan shrugged, hoping he wouldn't pursue it. "I recognized the underlying architecture of her features. The rest is just window dressing."

For one moment, he looked as if he'd just witnessed actual magic, and the admiration in his eyes warmed her. Ten minutes later that warmth vanished when Booth informed her he needed his ducks in a row and that was going to mean "cops in the field, squints in the lab." She wasn't one of his ducks. He broke their truce and their agreement, and only Brennan's fast thinking and ruthless blackmailing prevented him from ditching her right there.

She wouldn't abandon Cleo to political maneuvering.

The urgency for justice increased when Hodgins announced that Cleo was depressed and taking anti-nausea medications. And as Brennan had touched the pelvis, a tiny wail pitched in her ears. She checked and discovered those tiny bones they'd recovered, the ones that had been dismissed as frog bones, were in fact fetal bones. Cleo had died while pregnant.

Though she would never approve such baseless speculation, Jack Hodgins indulged gleefully. Cleo's boyfriend worked for a senator, a senator who'd gotten Cleo pregnant and then killed her to avoid a scandal. Furthermore, unless Seeley Booth was the kind of guy 'who knows where his bread is buttered,' he wouldn't be allowed to head up the investigative task force. If Booth was an honest agent, Hodgins declared, he'd be shut out. Cleo wouldn't get justice, no matter what.

Cleo's bones told Brennan the story of her end. Estranged from her parents, pregnant and sick from it, distraught that the man who'd fathered her child wanted nothing to do with her now, she'd grown depressed. Then the attack, stabbed from behind and brutally stabbed several more times while she struggled and succumbed. The scoring on her distal phalanges came from a knife, cutting off her finger tips. Then the final, barbaric act: smashing her face and skull.

It sickened her, to think of the final, terrifying moments; to think of the desperate attempt to survive that Cleo had made. Brennan stood hopelessly at the edge of the lab, caught between despair and the sense that there was more she wanted to do for Cleo. She had the skill to identify Cleo, but not to bring her justice. For that, Cleo needed someone like Booth.

"Wanna get a drink?" Angela stood next to her with a slender brow raised in inquiry. "Non-topical application. Glug, glug, woo-hoo!"

In no mood for levity, Brennan couldn't muster even the will to answer, just a dismal glance that oozed pain.

"Come on, Sweetie." Angela took her by the arm and led her down the side 'alley' toward a bench tucked under the loft.

"What if Booth's right? What if I'm only good with bones, and lousy with people?" He'd said that to her this afternoon, when she'd asked him a question. _"Getting information out of live people is a lot different than getting it out of a pile of bones." _He wouldn't give her any information, not even the directions to hell after he advised her to take the trip.

"People like you," Angela reassured her.

"I don't care if men like me."

Angela laughed. "Okay, interesting leap from people to men, but I'm sure it means nothing." She suspected Brennan meant one man in particular.

"I hate psychology." Arms crossed, Brennan dispatched that little tease completely. A breath later she heaved a sigh, acknowledging the bitter truth about not just men, but just about everyone. "My most meaningful relationships are with dead people."

_What about me?_ Angela frowned but then reminded herself Brennan was undoubtedly reacting to something that she'd just been told. "Who said that?"

Brennan laughed, sounding of hopeless desolation. "It's true." Hadn't Angela just said it this morning, that someday she might see the living as well as the dead?

They sat together on the bench, and Brennan knew Angela would listen to the proof. "I understand Cleo, and her bones are all I've seen. When she was seven, she broke her wrist—probably falling off her bike—and two weeks later, before the cast was even removed, she got right back on that bike and broke it all over again. And when she was being murdered, she fought back, hard, even though … she was so depressed she could hardly get up in the morning. She didn't welcome death. Cleo wanted to live."

Brennan trembled again, feeling an echo of that kind of desperation, and falling again into the despair of knowing she couldn't help Cleo enough. The bones would whisper into eternity, always pleading to be heard.

"Honey, you ever think that maybe you come off a little distant because you connect too much?"

Didn't Angela connect with them also? Brennan's thoughts tumbled in confusion, wondering if that's what it was: that she saw herself too much in the stories the bones told her.

"I hate psychology. It's a soft science." Psychology had never given her answers, only misunderstanding and misdirection. She couldn't help that their life echoed hers, and it had nothing to do with psychology or ghosts, only bitter experience.

Angela took her arm affectionately. "I know but, people are mostly soft."

"Except for their bones," Brennan mused. The bones told her things, the information she could never seem to get from a living person. Booth had snarled he wasn't one of her skeletons. She wondered what she might discover if she ever had the opportunity to view Booth's bones. But then he would have to be dead, and even before she felt the little shudder rumble under her skin, Brennan knew she did not want Booth to be dead.

"Yeah." Angela was agreeing only because it was both true and completely not the point. "You want some advice?"

Brennan gave her a cynical, guarded look. "Glug, glug, woo-hooh?"

"Offer up a little bit of yourself once in a while. Just, tell somebody something you're not completely certain you want them to know."

Brennan chuckled without mirth. "That's the second time I've received that advice." Booth had said this earlier also, although it had not come out sounding nearly as helpful as Angela's suggestion did. But, maybe there was something to it, something she could use.

Angela grinned a bit of encouragement, please to see Brennan's mood lifting. "Well, you know, I give great advice."

Brennan nodded, her mind already back to the real problem. What she said next was all about Cleo, not Booth or Angela's advice. "I'm going to have to push this to the next level."

Booth didn't trust her, he wouldn't listen. How could she get him to listen to her, to accept her help on Cleo's case?

The pensive turn of her thoughts was unmistakable, forcing Angela to concede there might be more than one worry unsettling her friend tonight. "What's really going on, Brennan?"

She stared down at her fingers, thinking of the work her hands had done last night, all night. What she'd done the night before. Helping Cleo was worth it, but two nights of limited sleeping had her exhausted and running low on energy. Booth's arrogant dismissal was hitting her in a raw spot, and she wanted to be angry at him, tell him she had changed her mind and would renew her previous vow never to work with him again.

"I keep seeing Cleo's face," she said instead. Cleo's face, crying. Cleo's hands clasped over her abdomen, protective in the last moments. That was why she wasn't going to tell Booth off. She would work with him, push and shove and fight him to the ground if she had to.

Angela sat very still, knowing there would be more if she just waited.

"Booth is the only means of helping Cleo get justice. And her parents. I just … I can take their pain away. I can tell them what happened to her, I can maybe tell them who to blame. If I have to put up with Booth, I'll do it."

"What happened between you two last year?"

"It doesn't matter. It was my fault. I'm not good with people."

"Booth told you that, didn't he." Angela's flat statement barely covered the outrage that was starting to build. It might be about time to have a little talk with Agent Studley. "He doesn't know you."

"Booth is good with people."

"Yeah, well, he isn't good with you, okay? Deep down, Booth knows that too, or else he wouldn't have had to work so hard to get you back. All right? Just trust me on this."

"He doesn't even like me, Ange. He's just using me." Brennan felt tears stinging her eyes, knowing she'd earned his contempt last year. It was a rational decision he'd made to hold his nose - literally - and drag the expert 'Bones' to his crime scene. Everything else was forced, a peeling layer of politeness that didn't fully conceal his distaste for her, for what she knew, for who she was.

It shouldn't matter to her that he didn't like her personally. It should not matter that he was using her, that the moment she'd given him what he wanted, he'd reneged on their arrangement. It was logical. So why did it hurt so much...?

"But it's okay. I don't care about that," Brennan decided finally. "I only care about Cleo. She didn't deserve to be erased."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: I always thought that Booth had really hurt Brennan's feelings during the Pilot episode, yet she insisted on working with him anyway. In this story, it was a passion for justice that drove Brennan to forge the partnership with Booth. Before Booth, she could only connect with the dead victims in front of her, but when he introduced Brennan to Cleo's parents, Booth opened up the world of hurt in the living survivors. This is the beginning of Brennan's journey.

Angela's begins in the next chapter, which is finished and will post on Friday. Someone special will make an appearance...

Information about the degradation of textiles (how long it takes clothing to decay) came from _Degradation of Clothing and Other Dress Materials Associated with Buried Bodies of Both Archaeological and Forensic Interest_, by R C Janaway. All mistakes are mine.


	8. The Temperance of the Artist

Author's Note: I would like to thank everyone who is reading this, reviewing, following and favoriting. Even the silent readers, thank you for spending your time. When the writing gets tough, it helps to know there are people waiting for an update. You all motivate me to keep going. :D

* * *

~Q~

~The Temperance of the Artist~

~Q~

**Alas, why gnaw you so your nether lip?**  
** Some bloody passion shakes your very frame: **  
** These are portents; but yet I hope, I hope,**  
** They do not point on me.**

_Othello, Act V, scene 2_

~Q~

If Brennan were less prone to cynicism, she might have thought Agent Booth just wanted to drive her insane when he turned up at the symposium at American University. Flashing that devastating smile, he teased her publicly about the source of her novel's hero. Later, he walked her to her car as if they were ending a date and after expressing shock in her recent upgrade (from ancient Jeep to sleek Mercedes), he teased her again about parking the wrong way. She almost dared to hope he'd only come to flirt. But when she finally asked him what he wanted (because an express mission of flirting was far outside the realm of possibility), Booth revealed his true interest in her companionship: remains were found behind a shopping mall. Which, of course, proved that she was correct to run on the fumes of lingering distrust.

Why would the FBI be involved in what would probably be a local case, she wondered. And he showed her the flyer of a missing little boy.

All angst on his non-existent interest in her vanishing, Brennan visibly deflated, the words leaking out through a tiny puncture in her composure. "Oh, a child..."

"Yeah."

She glanced up at Booth, noting the tightness in his features and that his eyes had turned obsidian. He looked angry and closed off, but suddenly seemed to relax when he noted Brennan's concerned regard. As if he wanted to distract her, Booth reverted back to teasing her about the proper way to park a Mercedes. When she offered to drive, he retorted that he couldn't possibly be seen riding in such a decadent vehicle (though he didn't use those precise words, he'd said something about it detracting from his FBI gravitas), and Brennan felt rejected in the most peculiar way.

For the first time in her recollection, someone rebuffed her for having too much material wealth. Too much car. Before the decade-old Cherokee, she'd driven a Pinto and had fielded more than a few jeers and insults over the barely functioning, half-rusted jalopy that she'd barely managed to afford. (It cost $800, all her life savings at 18.)

She frowned and glared at his retreating back, muttering under her breath that it was _his_ fault she'd written that damn book. It was his fault she had a brand new silver Mercedes convertible with heated leather seats, and his fault the publisher had begun nagging/begging her for a second novel. And she was not an idiot for wanting to guard this car that was the most priceless, precious thing she'd ever earned through the fruits of her own mind and imagination. It was the first truly valuable thing she'd ever owned. And it was his fault she had it.

It felt good to blame him for everything, even when she knew she was being unkind. Because being mad at Booth was so much easier than contemplating the remains of a child waiting for her behind a shopping mall.

~Q~

When it was children, everyone seemed a bit more precarious, slower to smile, quicker to blink back 'motes of dust' or other ocular irritants. No one ever cried, but allergies always seemed to flare up mysteriously.

In the field, Zack was fine, perhaps because he was too busy complaining about looking like "the Great Kazoo." (She didn't know what that meant, because he looked nothing like the childish musical instrument, even when wearing the helmet with heat sensing equipment.) However, once they were back in the lab and the small remains were laying out on a steel table under harsh lights, he reacted with slight hesitations when answering Brennan's questions. She repressed her own inclination to shed lachrymal fluid over yet another atrocity by directing and guiding Zack in how to analyze and observe the little boy's body.

Not enough time had passed for Brennan to place tissue depth markers when Angela approached, pale and reluctant. She stood watching the small face, her own features sketched in sorrow. Determinedly, she lifted her charcoal and studied the orbital sockets, beginning with eyes. A face began to form on the paper as Angela's hand moved. The curving lines edged out a forehead, a chin; softly blurred shadows highlighted his nose, the hollows of his cheeks; tiny streaks formed brows and a pursing pair of lips.

She saw who he was, who he had been. Lively, a bit mischievous, too trusting. She saw him alive. When Zack explained that the child had died from blunt force trauma, it was too much. Angela gasped, unable to escape flickering images of violence impacted on a living child.

Brennan noticed and looked up immediately with concern. "Are you all right?"

No, she wasn't, but Angela tried to explain it away, knowing that Brennan would see him also. "He's so _small_." She paused in her sketch to recover and stabilize herself. Remembering him alive, before the violence, was the only way she could keep going. She would capture that joyful little boy instead of what her imagination hurled at her. "It's all right. Go on with your work. I'm okay."

Brennan looked toward the skull, seeing his sweet little face watching them, but then she forced her gaze away. Hodgins rescued her by starting to describe the taphonomic changes that suggested the interval of death had been only 36-48 hours before discovery. His solemn professionalism provided a steady counterpoint to Angela's tense empathy.

Considering the short time interval between missing and found, Brennan tried not to let herself think too much even though she knew where they were heading. Charlie's pelvis had already begun a moaning that sounded low in the base of her own skull. Brennan felt a headache approaching, and a need to push through the ordeal as quickly as science would allow. So she pointed out to Zack that Charlie's clothing had been removed and found a few yards away from the body, in clean and intact condition. "What does that imply?"

"That the victim wasn't wearing them when he was killed," Zack answered thickly.

"Which suggests he was sexually assaulted," Brennan added softly.

Spurred by an almost desperate need to escape the talk of violent assault and murder, Angela hastily finished her sketch. "I'm done." She thrust it at Brennan, who matched it to the missing child flyer. Angela's sketch, plus the clothing they found that matched what he was last reported wearing, meant they could identify him as Charles Gregory Sanders.

Gazing at the portrait through a blurring of tears, Angela shook her head. "I hate this," she whispered. She turned and retreated to the quiet of her office.

Zack was standing silently beside the table, looking at the bones with as much detachment as he could manage, and nearly failing. Brennan slowly let out a breath, forcing thoughts of violation and force and filth out of her mind. Charlie watched her through wavering eyes, and all she could think to say was, "Me, too."

She called Booth to inform him they'd confirmed the remains matched the missing child.

He blew out a breath that rustled against the phone's speaker like static. "I'm going to inform the family. Do you want to come with me?"

There would be a tearful mother sobbing out raggedly fresh grief and unanswerable questions. The notion of having to face her unprepared chilled Brennan, because she knew she would feel out of place, would undoubtedly say the wrong thing and make Booth glare at her. The mother would feel worse, it was just a bad idea.

"No." It came out fast and sharp, probably socially inappropriate. Before he could criticize her lack of grace Brennan pulled back, asking herself for a logical reason why she didn't want to go with him so she could temper the too-quick answer with an acceptable explanation. "I have some things I need to do here. Thank you for asking."

~Q~

Angela threw herself into coding, keeping her eyes glued to a computer screen while her fingers flew over a keyboard and typed instructions in C++. After that, compiling and testing took enough mental energy that she could escape thinking about Charlie Sanders directly. Indirectly, he was the reason she was coding so quickly: if she got this mass recognition program finished and running correctly, they could scan through the mall's security cameras for children Charlie's size, and possibly find who he was last seen with.

It hadn't occurred to her how extraordinary the work was, so when Booth arrived and complimented her, Angela felt a cold chill of loss gush over her.

"You're actually one of _them_, aren't you."

She understood in that moment that she had changed, become someone that a year ago, she wouldn't have been able to understand or connect with.

"One of who?" She asked, hoping she was wrong.

Laughing a bit with disbelief, and perhaps a bit impressed as well, he explained. "A _squint_. I mean, you look normal and you act normal but, you're actually one of them."

This was why her love life had dried up, Angela knew. She found it impossible to explain that her art was dead people's faces. Even when she wrote computer programs instead, it was always about the dead. Normal, living people did not want to talk about the dead, about staring into rotting, moldy bones and seeing a face, or recreating the violent means of murder. The men she confided in inevitably reacted with discomfort or outright disgust, bailing out of the fleeting relationships as fast as their feet would carry them. Angela considered lying, but then what kind of solid relationship could possibly happen if she couldn't talk about her work...?

Booth had certainly called it. She was becoming one of _them_, and Angela couldn't hide how much she wished he'd not made the comparison. "This whole mass recognition program was Brennan's idea. I'm completely normal. Really."

Brennan heard how unsure Angela sounded, and wondered why being considered a 'squint' was upsetting to Angela. Squints were people with high IQs and basic reasoning skills, she'd once told Booth. Angela was smart and versatile, and wasn't that a commendable thing? But she didn't want to be a squint. This must be a continuation of what they'd argued about before, Brennan decided. Getting used to death, the possibility that Angela had admitted fearing. The consequences of doing this job were finally catching up with Angela, reshaping her, and that's how Brennan knew her friend was at a crossroads. She either needed to become 'one of them,' or leave now before the job's effect on her became permanent.

"Yeah, maybe before you got this job, but now….?" And the way Booth trailed off made his implication clear. Booth thought Angela was both smart enough and jaded enough to be a squint. In his mind, that was sort of a bad thing.

"I see Charlie!" Brennan said, cutting the tension and giving Angela a small reprieve from Booth's dubious admiration.

"Whoa." Booth was sad to see the small boy, but impressed that the program worked. "That's him, all right."

"Oh, God," Angela almost sobbed.

Growing increasingly concerned for her friend, Brennan laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Ang? Are you okay?"

"It's just that, these are probably the last pictures of this little guy alive." Angela stared at the small boy trapped inside a recognition matrix, still alive, breathing, walking to his doom. She couldn't get past his transition from alive to dead without imagining all the pain and fear that had gone with it.

Unable to hide his own discomfort, Booth glanced uneasily at Angela, noting she wasn't handling this case very well. He turned to Brennan, saw her face drawn tight with worry and an echoing anguish.

"Why is he alone? Why isn't anyone with him?" Angela's tear-streaked question wasn't just rhetorical, but also a valid one from the investigative point of view.

Booth vowed he would find out the answer.

~Q~

When she went looking for Angela two hours later, Brennan saw that she wasn't in her office. She turned, walking through the side corridors that flanked the lab until she found Angela sitting dejectedly on a bench near the exit.

"Are you thinking of leaving the Jeffersonian?" It was an extremely perceptive question, one that she wouldn't typically think to ask. But this was Angela, and over the last year she had come to know the artist very well.

Angela looked away, thinking about what Booth had said. A squint: brainy, driven, no social life. "I'm not really this person."

"What person?" Brennan sat beside her.

"I'm not like you."

The moment she said it, Angela felt the way her friend stiffened beside her. Brennan's eyes flickered, but she held still and absorbed the blow because what Angela had said was rational. She'd been told enough times that she was clueless and cold, wrongly made in so many ways, and so naturally Angela would not want to be like Brennan. No one would. Watching Brennan accept it made Angela feel even worse, because she also didn't want to be the kind of person who stomped on a friend's feelings.

She tried to soften the comparison, highlight her own shortcomings. "I'm not driven by the need for justice, and all that. I'm a good time girl."

Sorrow colored the words, an admission that she admired Brennan intensely, and yet had never planned to find a role model in the serious scientist. Angela knew she was torn over who she thought she was and who she thought she would become if she stayed here. This wasn't about Paris any longer. Or maybe it was: giving up Paris.

"We have good times," Brennan said softly. They went out for drinks together, sometimes to nightclubs or on dates. They went to the Arboretum so Angela could practice painting, or took in one of the national art galleries. Once Brennan had convinced Angela to go to the Library of Congress with her while she hunted for an obscure ethnology book, explaining Angela would appreciate the architecture. They'd had fun quietly deriding the rubber-necking tourists and stodgy congressional aides wandering through the stacks that were open to the public.

"Cracking jokes over murdered skeletons is _not_ good times." Angela disagreed.

She was talking about work, not their friendship. It was only marginally reassuring, but she could manage this. Maybe. Brennan drew a breath, admitting softly, "I know it's harder on you than it is the rest of us."

Knowing how much Brennan struggled, recalling the reason she'd stayed in the first place, Angela was quick to shake her head. "No it's not."

But then she glanced at Brennan, _knowing_ that Brennan struggled too, and curious at what she'd just said. So she asked, wondering what insight Brennan might give her. "Why?"

"Because you look at their faces. We look at everything else. It's more clinical for us. For you ... it's personal." Brennan knew she could look away from their faces. She could look at their hands, or their ribs; she could look at x-rays and bone sections. She could walk away from the bones and the noise would decrease. Angela always had to see _them_: she carried the emotional burden, expressed it in her art.

"When we see a murdered child—"

"Honey," Angela interrupted. "I— No offense, I'm really not up for one of your 'it-takes-a-village,' anthropology lessons."

Brennan looked down, then away, a bit hurt by the rejection of her sympathy.

Angela continued gently, "this is the longest I've ever had a job. That's because of _you_."

It was true: something about Brennan had drawn her in, cultivated in her a mixture of fascination and compassion that she could not abandon. Brennan was what tethered her to the Jeffersonian. The job itself was interesting and it paid well, but it was never her style to stay in one place for more than a few months. Angela had gathered up more than enough money to reach Paris months ago, and still she'd stayed.

But in staying this long, she'd delved into depths she didn't know she had, had discovered talents and intelligence that had been shuffled aside in her pursuit of epicurean happiness. She was changing, becoming someone else. This serious, compassionate adult who spoke of pixels and knew how to engineer a mass-recognition program and could design a holographic projector ... who was she? She was no longer simply Angela Pearly-Gates (name-withheld-for-the-sake-of-avoiding-humiliatio n, thanks-Dad!) Montenegro. The Pearly-Gates had vanished, leaving her trapped on Montenegro. Black Mountain. Darkness and an insurmountable height.

_Is this who I am? Who I'm meant to be?_

"If this is about hours, or time to do your own art, then…"

"Just let me work on it," Angela broke in. "Okay?"

Brennan nodded sadly.

"I'm an artist. I used to draw naked guys. Now I draw dead guys." Angela had tears in her voice, mourning the loss of her flighty nature. She felt like a bird with clipped wings, watching her brilliantly colored feathers scattering in the wind while she remained grounded on the black mountain and unable to recapture them.

Brennan said softly, "Just don't decide anything without talking to me." Though she was technically Angela's boss, the request was as a friend. Don't try to go through this alone.

"Of course I won't," Angela promised. She sighed and leaned back, her thoughts dampened. Beside her, Brennan did the same.

~Q~

Though Goodman had reassured her somewhat, the cataclysmic shift in Angela's self-perception continued to plague her. Unable to decide what to do, she finally sat herself down in front of Avalon Harmonia, the skilled psychic she'd met during her not-so-well-advised stint as the girlfriend of a self-described 'circus freak.'

"I just don't know who I am anymore," she lamented. "I mean, Booth said I'm a squint. Like, a science geek. I'm an _artist_!"

Avalon regarded Angela with her usual solemn gaze. Even before Angela had begun pouring her heart out, the calm woman had quietly withdrawn her stack of cards, selecting the Major Arcana for this spiritual reading. While Angela talked she'd also shuffled the cards, and now as she was winding down, Avalon's palm was outstretched to receive the shuffled cards again. She soothed with a soft tone, her voice laced with hints of Brooklyn and mystery.

"You are at a crossroads, the collision between who you are and who you could become. This is a time of decision." She proffered the deck, fanned out. "Draw a card, Angela."

Extending her hand, she closed her eyes and pulled a card from the center of the small stack.

"Place it here," Avalon instructed. "This is the first position, it represents where you are in your spiritual journey at this moment in time."

When Angela had obeyed, Avalon laid a fingertip over the card, feeling its energy. She smiled. "Turn it over."

Angela did. The High Priestess smiled up at her, regal and offering solace in uncertainty.

"You have chosen the most ambiguous of cards, and yet the one that offers the greatest hope." Avalon met Angela's nervous gaze with warm confidence. "If the High Priestess appears when you are making a decision, this is a sign that the answers will come to you. You must be patient, trust yourself. Everything you need to know already exists within you."

Avalon paused, feeling again the surge from the card. "There is more. The High Priestess often represents the unconscious mind, but also the supernatural. She is the gateway to realms that we may never fully comprehend or master. You have a power within you, one that you don't fully understand. Trust that power, Angela. Use it."

Angela's breath caught, let out on a sigh and a shudder. "Okay," she agreed, mostly because she didn't know what else to say.

"Take another card. This card will reveal the central lesson you are struggling to master."

As the card hit the table, again Avalon touched it. The power hummed below her fingertips, and she knew it was one of the most powerful cards. She turned it, showing Death.

Angela gasped, disbelieving the coincidence that she should draw upon the thing that she feared.

"Don't be afraid," Avalon hastened to reassure her. "This is a spiritual message, not a literal one. Death represents transformation. Change. As a living, growing snake sheds its old skin to reveal one that is shiny and new, so do we shed our old selves and perceptions when we grow. An old attitude or perspective is no longer useful and you have to let go of it."

"So, you mean … I should no longer think of myself as an artist?" she asked, grief-stricken.

"No, on the contrary. It means you should not allow your identity as an artist to limit your growth into something more." Avalon laid a soothing hand on Angela's arm. "At times, the Death card speaks of personal sacrifice, the idea of giving something up for a greater good. For your own good. The part of you that you are afraid of losing, you have to let go of that fear, Angela. You're not going to lose anything—you're going to gain something."

"Draw the third card," Avalon continued. "This position speaks of the forces that provide a positive influence on your spiritual journey."

This time the card sang out to her, a high and ethereal voice. Avalon knew what it was even before she turned her over: the lady, Justice.

"Angela, you are on an amazing journey. Do you realize what opportunity has come to you? All of our actions have consequences, both our bad actions and our good ones. Justice is singing to me, telling me that your quest is hers, and it will bring you untold rewards."

"Oh," Angela sighed. "I … I've been helping with forensic cases, helping identify people who were murdered."

"But it scares you," Avalon guessed.

"Yeah."

"The fourth card shows the influences that are holding you back, getting in your way. Draw, Angela."

As she set it down and Avalon passed her palm over it, this card crackled. Avalon pulled her hand away quickly, as if shocked by it. "There is great power here," she breathed in awe. She turned it, revealing Judgment, but upside down.

She sat back, awed by the power of the cards. "This is one of the most powerful readings I've ever done."

Angela looked at the layout doubtfully, seeing just four cards laid out in a straight horizontal line. "What do you mean?"

"Judgment is the nexus between Death and Justice, two cards that you've just drawn. It represents rebirth, through the integration of all the parts of yourself. You will be changed, but you will not lose anything. The fact that the card is upside down shows me that you are resisting the change. You must stop fighting it, Angela. Let it happen."

She nodded, feeling tears flow over her cheeks. "That's what I should do? Stay at the Jeffersonian?"

Avalon proffered the deck one more time. "The answer is here. The fifth card."

It whispered. Even Angela heard it, her startled gaze whipping up to Avalon's. Avalon cautiously turned it over, knowing this was the hand of fate working through her.

"Oh, my God!" Angela bolted upright, backing away from the layout with a reverence that might be suitable with encountering divinity itself. "Oh my God. How is this possible?"

Avalon smiled, shook her head in near equal astonishment. "The universe is speaking to you. This card shows you what you must do after Death transforms you. It is the act of unification, perfect unity in the disparate parts of you that you've been struggling to accept."

"No," Angela gasped. "No, God, you … You have no idea what that means!"

"It also means friendship, partnership," Avalon translated gently, "the coming together of two distinct beings that must function as one."

"It's her _name_!"

Avalon looked up curiously.

"Her name is Temperance Brennan!"

"Temperance: A partnership, and making peace with yourself. The cards have spoken. This is the answer to your question."

~Q~

The sound of Angela's laughter drifted across the lab, wrapping itself around them both and tugging a small echo of a smile out of Brennan.

Booth glanced over to where Angela stood, teasing Hodgins, and turned back to his new partner in time to see the evidence of her happiness. He liked seeing it, the way her lips softened and her eyes seemed to burn with an inner light. They'd been at odds so much over the last few weeks that he'd nearly forgotten how much her rare smile had the power to stun him.

The change in the artist since three days ago was nearly as remarkable, tempting Booth to pass a comment. "So, I take it Angela's not quitting?"

"No," she answered, the smile growing incrementally wider. Brennan shook her head and chuckled. "Yesterday she told me she went to a psychic for a Tarot card reading."

Tarot cards? Booth frowned, thinking Sister Mary Margarete would have had plenty to say against 'devious tools of divination.' "What could cards possibly tell her that would be helpful?"

Brennan turned away from the micrograph she was looking at, leaving behind the certainty of osteons to reveal the uncertain source of Angela's new sense of confidence. "I'm still not exactly sure, but apparently the key cards were Death, Justice, and Temperance."

"There's a card with your name on it?" He'd imagined something more mundane, such as the Seven of Diamonds or a Jack of Spades.

"Yes." She leaned toward him to grab another sample from the table he was leaning against. One hand gently pushed him aside, but her glinting silver gaze captured his with just the slightest hint of teasing. "It represents balance; integrating disparate entities and forging partnerships."

Booth stepped back into his place and closed the space between them, his own thoughts spinning at implications. "Like, you and me?"

Meeting his question with careful consideration, she wasn't sure how to interpret the heated promise in his gaze. "Like all of us."

"We're definitely disparate entities, and yet we make great partners, Bones."

"You don't believe in Tarot cards," she reminded him with a sly lift of one brow. And he had a girlfriend, she reminded herself sternly. But ... he'd trusted her when she said she knew how to talk to Shawn Cook. And she'd trusted him when she promised Shawn her 'friend in the FBI' would ensure Shawn was reunited with his brother and foster mother. He kept her promise, made it happen.

"But I do believe in Temperance," Booth assured her. "And everything it implies."

They'd worked together, trusted each other, and ... they were partners now.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: The layout Avalon used and the interpretations of the cards are authentic, but I reverse-engineered the reading to suit my own purposes. ;)

~Q~

So ... I have good news and I have bad news. The good news is, my winter term has started and that means I will have an hour a day (during my commute to class) to think about nothing but Bones. All my best thinking, planning and story ideas happen when I'm on my way to somewhere else. The bad news is, unlike last term, I have classes on Fridays. Last term I had Fridays off and spent that day on homework so I could write on Saturday, then spend the next five days editing. (I always try to stay at least one chapter ahead.) This term I have classes on Friday plus a long lab on Saturday, which gives me far less 'free time.'

Long story short, I'm going to try to continue to post smaller chapters once per week. If that doesn't work, I'll switch to larger chapters every two weeks. Either way, I will continue to update regularly until the story is finished.


	9. The Experience in the Teacher

Author Laughs at herself: What was that I said about shorter chapters? Hah. I just can't help myself. :D

Author's Ambition: One thing that I love to do with fan fiction is to take a single scene or even just a line and imagine what the source of it is. What is the back story or motivation? Why do they do these things we see on screen? In this chapter, empathy takes a starring role, and turns everything on its ear.

* * *

~Q~

~The Experience in the Teacher~

~Q~

**'Tis better to be vile than vile esteemed,**  
** When not to be receives reproach of being,**  
** And the just pleasure lost, which is so deemed**  
** Not by our feeling, but by others' seeing.**

_Sonnet 121, lines 1-4 _

~Q~

The latest change in Brennan's personal habits came courtesy of expedience and Booth's ever-empty stomach. She'd quickly come to know that the always active man consumed energy as fast as fire, the calories burning at a furious clip because he was always in motion. Always. His fingers danced with a poker chip, his feet paced relentless circles around a crime scene, his eyes wandered the landscape. Never a moment of stillness (except when he was sad and reflective, something she'd only seen once) meant the calorie consumption was a Constant.

Consequently, he always wanted to eat.

"Let's go over this at the Royal Diner," he'd suggested one day when she'd stopped in at the Hoover to give him the final paperwork on the Charlie Sanders case. He took the files, glanced at his clock and in an instant decided that lunch plus work was a perfectly acceptable way to get things done. The Royal Diner was tucked into a corner apartment building four blocks away from the Hoover. A 1940s era throwback to the malt shop, it was popular for breakfast and lunch, just close enough to reach comfortably on foot and just far enough away from the National Mall to go unnoticed by the river of tourists streaming past the Hoover to take in Ford's Theater (scene of the Booth family's ancestral sin and ironically located one block away from the building where one modern Booth tried to even the cosmic score).

Despite all of those perfectly good reasons to eat there, Brennan had never ventured so far beyond the confines of the Jeffersonian for a meal, mainly because she rarely ever left her office to eat at all. This day was no different from any other.

"Booth, I have to…" and the long explanation of the thousand and one things she had to get done that day might as well never be articulated again for all the good it did to say it the first time. Booth took her by the elbow and all but beguiled her out of the FBI with nothing but his smooth voice and the sight of _that_ smile. Yeah, that one. Her vow never to fall for it again had lasted about two months.

In retaliation, she stole his fries.

"Hey! Get your own." Booth slapped her hand away the first time. After she'd succeeded in eluding further slaps and absconded with several more, he gave up.

"You're not going to eat them all," Brennan insisted reasonably. She had deduced this from the enormous hamburger – double patty, cheddar cheese, plus an _egg_? How much protein does anyone need?! – and the old fashioned malt milkshake, cherry pie, and a glass of milk. (More protein?)

He had intended to share the large side-order of fries, obviously, because no one that physically fit would remain in that superb condition for long on a steady diet of grease and meat. She was doing him a favor. "Besides, you need more vegetables; all that protein and saturated fat isn't good for you."

Blowing out an irritated groan, Booth glared at her. "I lift weights. I need protein."

"Not that much."

"Bones, if I wanted to have my mother nag me, I'd call her."

It was a harmless comment. She knew he hadn't meant to clout her sideways with an aimless remark that would have only been a tease to just about anyone else. Somehow, in that moment, it hurt; and she didn't know why. It was irrational. A tight, shoving sensation pressed deeply into her chest, tight across the center where her heart struggled to beat. Breathing, suddenly, was an activity that required conscious effort.

Brennan dropped back in her chair, the stolen fry falling to the edge of her plate. She turned towards the window, blinking at the sunlight streaming into her tearing eyes. Bright lights often initiated the corneal reflex (a blink), which in turn sent sympathetic tears flowing over the cornea. She could blame it on sunlight, the pain in her chest a passing bout of idiopathic angina. None of it had anything to do with what he'd said.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly.

"For what." She shrugged, facing him again with near normality. With effort, she drew in and blew out a steady stream of air and the crushing pain retreated.

"For whatever I just made you feel." His soft chocolate eyes bored into hers, tunneling into her depths effortlessly. "I wasn't thinking."

"I'm fine." Brennan dropped her eyes, retreating before he could see too much. She read bones; she was starting to understand that Booth read people, quite well.

"So, is it some time?"

He'd reached out and placed a hand over her arm, triggering a gentle shiver in her. Brennan felt herself being pulled back under his spell, drawn in by the nonsensical question more than anything else. The way he was touching her only added to the confusion as she struggled to understand what he'd asked. "Time for what?"

"You said you would tell me about your time in foster care 'some time,' but not that night because you had a party. How about now?"

"There's nothing to tell." But she was avoiding his direct gaze, her body tense and her lower lip worrying between gnashing teeth.

"How old were you when your grandfather got you out?"

Brennan blinked, recalling the familiar lie she'd told. It wasn't like her to lie but, this was one she'd been telling for nearly ten years. It fell naturally from her lips the moment anyone asked about what happened after _that night_, repeated so often that it had become its own wishful truth. What she'd wanted to be true, told to indifferent strangers so often it almost felt true if she didn't pause to think, was that someone had cared enough to take care of her.

But Booth wasn't a stranger that was going to vanish from her life in a few hours or days. He was her partner and partners shared things to build trust. She sighed, giving up the whole truth with just one, brief answer. "I was eighteen."

As the significance of the number sank in, he pierced her with those knowing eyes.

"I don't like talking about it," she defended quietly. "When people asked what happened after my parents disappeared, I always said my grandfather took me in because that was a nicer story than the truth." And then they wouldn't ask any more, just twist the knife a bit deeper with some vague comment about how fortunate she was to have a grandfather. Never mind how unfortunate she'd been to have vanished parents in the first place. Everyone always seemed to forget being orphaned was a far cry from fortunate, even taking foster care out of the equation.

"Were your foster parents nice?"

She shrugged again, unwilling to divulge that ugly truth. "Some of them were." Some weren't, was the unvoiced rest of the answer.

_"Do you have any idea what the foster system is like?" _She'd asked him that, furious and frustrated when his arrest of Margaret Sanders dumped two brothers back into the DC fostering system. Beds were limited, the brothers would be split up, no one really cared what the kids did or what happened to them except for the rare few who were like Margaret. _"Do you?" he'd retorted right back._ She'd stormed out of his office that day because she wasn't prepared to tell him just how damn much she knew about the system. She said nothing now, and the silence said 'you don't want to know.'

Booth could read people and he read her like the front-page news, with a quick flick of the eyes.

"I understand," he told her quietly.

Her skeptical scowl hit him squarely in the glabella, that round little area right between the brows. How could he possibly understand?

Booth's hand tightened gently over her arm and then withdrew. "There are things I don't like to talk about also."

His time in the military. He didn't like to talk about that, she knew. It didn't compare, and yet strangely, it did. She nodded, relieved by the soft blanket of empathy that he tossed over her dark secrets. He had his own; he understood.

"You dropped my fry," Booth nudged. He lifted it from her plate to her lips and pressed gently until she laughed and bit.

Ever since then, Booth and Brennan had become a lunch-time fixture at the Royal Diner, and Booth's fries were in terminal jeopardy from her snatching fingers.

~Q~

Sometimes she wondered if empathy was only a function of experience. Could someone who had not experienced a particular sensation or pain, ever truly understand and feel that pain when it happened in another? Was it possible to have empathy if you only understood something intellectually and yet you had never truly 'felt' it?

Brennan looked down at the stress fractures radiating out from Maggie Schilling's wrists. The damage was greatest on the trapezium and the ulnar styloid process, small fissures that had appeared in the fragile bones as Maggie thrashed desperately against the unyielding steel handcuffs. Then, inflammation and the first stages of healing, followed by reactive bone growth to repair the damage. Microscopic slices demonstrated a period of two-three weeks had elapsed between the moment of injury and the moment of death. By that time, the pain from the swollen, broken wrist bones would have retreated.

She knew what caused the pain, knew how the signal of 'damage' was picked up first from nociceptors in the periostea and traveled from ruptured osteons via the afferent nerves all the way to the brain's primary sensory cortex. The brain would receive this information as 'pain,' and Maggie would have felt the burning turn slowly to unbearable throbbing, waves of pain that followed the pulsing of blood as it failed to fill leaking capillaries (they had pain receptors as well), then rushed to the area with much-needed phageocytes, nutrients, and building blocks for new bone.

But only the actual experience of breaking a bone could allow Brennan to know what it _felt_ like. She'd felt it, the _crack!_ (it sounded like a snapping twig or branch). The sharp, sudden tearing sensation as tissues ripped apart and bone ends were pulled roughly away from each other. Then, a moment of calm, when the pain was mild and the shock was great … until movement was attempted. Another sharp stab, as if the body itself were screaming _**'Don't!'**_ Don't do that, don't move. Don't hurt any more.

The throbbing would grow worse, raging unchecked during any attempt to move, then abating (a little, not much) when holding still. Unlike other physical sensations, pain receptors did not stop sending their vital information until the damage was repaired, because injured cells in the area would continue to leak out distress chemicals. It was the clarion call of the distress chemicals that activated the pain receptors in the first place.

Many people have experienced the pain of a broken bone, but very few can say they've experienced the unique pain of a decubitus ulcer. And so, very few could truly empathize with the pain such ulcers caused.

Zack had walked into the Bone Room while she stood beside Maggie's pelvis, slowly stroking her gloved fingertips over the anterior superior iliac spine and the greater trochanter of the femur. The rough damage caused by osteomyelitis burbled under her touch, and inside her head came the hiss of labored breaths exhaled into the darkness. She raised her eyes to her intern, wondering if it would ever be possible for him to know what it felt like.

"Have you ever been forced to lay in the same position for a long time?"

The question made Zack's nose wrinkle as he paused to ponder why she would ask him such a thing. "No, Dr. Brennan."

Thoughtfully, Brennan said, "Decubitus ulcers can begin within thirty minutes of immobility."

The Costello's might have given Maggie heroin if she was crying over the broken wrist bones. One or two hours of complete unconsciousness on the hard floor could have been the event that initiated the formation of pressure sores. Maggie would have awakened to more pain than she'd left behind.

Pressure from the body's weight squeezed blood out of the capillaries, depriving skin of vital oxygen and other nutrients. Damage is rapidly followed by necrosis of tissues, forming an inflamed red area on the surface of the skin that would take over a week to heal. That is, if it's caught rapidly and all pressure in that area is prevented until healing is complete. This was the reason handicapped and elderly people had to be repositioned every 15-30 minutes with near religious devotion. Pressure sores begin fast and take a very long time to heal. Stage 1 sores take well over a week to heal, causing great pain in the interim.

"If the pressure is not relived, a stage 1 sore can rapidly progress to stage 2 in less than 60 minutes, which is a break in the skin. Stages 3 & 4 go deeper still, involving muscle and bone." Brennan touched her finger again to the areas of osteomyelitis, the areas of infected bone. "Maggie had stage 4 sores on her hip and shoulder."

The pain starts out as a point of discomfort. A part of the body that covered a bony projection, usually thin skin lacking cushioning layers of muscle and fat, would begin to feel the unpleasant effects within 10-15 minutes. Most people shift their weight or change their position at this point. Maggie had not been able to.

Shoved into a small, dark space, bound as she was, and possibly drugged already because of the injuries to her wrists, Maggie had been unable to move.

Within an hour, the feeling grows to a sharp, piercing pain. It feels like a nail is being driven into that part of the body, an unrelenting sensation of being punctured and burned at the spot. It is the most intense moment of a broken bone turned up on 'high' with the knob broken off. The pain becomes the only thing you can focus on. It rages and consumes. Nothing stops it, nothing takes it away, except to move and moving is the one thing you can't do. Maggie would have been screaming for relief as the pressure sensors residing in the deepest layers of her skin were activated and went unrelieved.

The pain gets worse and worse, agonizing, as the skin breaks down and death spreads to the tissues beneath. Bacteria move in, causing inflammation, fever, infection. Pain rages unchecked in the dark, and there's no relief.

Unconsciously, Brennan shifted her weight and pressed a wrist into the sharp edge of her right hip, right above the scar. An echo of an ancient pain, sympathetic, was nagging her there. She couldn't move when they'd wedged her 175 cm frame into the trunk of a compact car.

"It would have been painful?" Zack asked.

Though she could shake herself loose from the dark, Brennan's mask of professional detachment remained elusive. Her voice cracked on the words, "When the nerve endings died, the pain would have finally stopped."

But by then she would have been sick from sepsis, feverish, moaning from the discomfort of fever chills and body aches. All this would have happened on the first few days of complete immobilization. Maggie had lived for over two weeks after that.

Two or three weeks.

It would have felt like an eternity. It would have been the very flames of hell consuming parts of her. Only the heroin would have offered her any respite as each successively higher dose swept her into black waters of oblivion where the pain still existed but just didn't matter so much; but heroin wore off and when it did, the pain came screaming back. Only Death, when it finally came, would have been a blessing because there's no coming back from the quiet coolness of death.

_I should recuse myself,_ Brennan thought tiredly. In the lab and on the witness stand, objectivity was of unparalleled importance. Even if it didn't cloud her judgment and cause her to miss details or misinterpret evidence, being perceived as anything less than fully objective risked her own competence and impartiality being questioned. If she let anyone see how much she felt, how much Maggie's death reminded her of her own living hell, they would insist she step back before the defense began questioning her. But she couldn't step back: the sound of Maggie's ragged breathing never left her ears, and the puckered brow and grimacing lips of a girl in agony never left her eyes. _"No one understands what it was like,"_ Maggie's bones seemed to whisper, _"Only you do."_

"Before then, she would have wished for death." Brennan turned and started away, needing to escape the muffled sounds Maggie's bones were making.

And Zack, inexperienced though he was, called her on it. "Are you positing a scenario? Because it's impossible to know what she might have wished." His curious regard never left her, except to drop back down to Maggie's bones and wander over the fraying scapula and humerus he was standing beside.

She wasn't objective, her own experience was clouding the issue. Brennan shook her head, shrugging off the unintentional criticism and pursing her lips. "I was just ... trying it on. Booth does it: he says it helps."

"I believe the correct colloquialism is 'trying it out.' Did it help?"

"No." She escaped then, but only in body. In her mind, it was always with her.

~Q~

"I think you're taking this too personally," Stires told her.

Brennan avoided his gaze, keeping her focus blurred on the file in front of her. "You think I should be more rational?" Keep your feelings out of this. Keep it professional. Report what happened to Maggie in the same tone you would report a broken down car to the mechanic. Detach. Stay rational.

"Yes." And his knowing gaze bored into the top of her head. He knew what was happening, he knew why the fifteen dollars words were spilling out when ten-cent words would do.

"Go to hell."

He tried to explain that he was only listening to his own jury consultant, creating reasonable doubt.

"This one isn't about winning a dinner or showing up your former student. This case is about putting away two people who murdered a 19 year old girl!"

"Tempe, you can't personalize the work."

_He knew. _He knew that Brennan hid behind technical language because _he'd_ taught her to do that; knew about her days in the car trunk because she'd told him. She'd told him about seeing Maggie's face. He knew how she felt about this case, the way she could not help but relive her own horror, and he'd kicked her anyway. After implying Brennan had fed her own history of captivity in the car trunk into Maggie's bones, he'd gone on to mock the clinical language she shielded herself behind. He'd deliberately used her past and her coping mechanism against her.

Brennan bit back the gastric fluids that had erupted in the back of her throat when she recognized her mistake was in trusting him. She knew better than anyone that everyone lied and no one could ever be fully trusted, yet she'd forgotten her own truth when she'd shared her feelings about Maggie. He could stand there today and tell her not to make it personal, when _he_ had brought up the fact that she had been his student in front of the entire court; it simply staggered her. _He_ had made it personal!

And now he was spewing out his hypocrisy, scalding her in the acid. Don't personalize it.

It was so damn personal at this point that she was afraid to walk into the courtroom. Stires had suggested to the jury that she was too emotionally involved not to invent interpretations of the evidence to suit her 'preconceived notions.' He'd implied she was projecting her own history of abandonment and abuse onto Maggie's remains. If the jury saw even the slightest hint of her emotional connection to Maggie, they would believe Stires. For Maggie's sake, she had to hold herself in check and report only the facts.

The bones whispered their stories to her and she trusted them because the hard bones can't lie, not the way living people so often lied out of their soft lips and pink, patent mouths. Long term bondage was the only explanation that satisfied all of the evidence in Maggie's honest bones. Just because she had also experienced bondage for days and could feel Maggie's pain, didn't make it unreal. What she felt about it, the echo of pain and terror that still woke her in the dark of night, didn't change what had happened to Maggie.

This is not about me, Brennan reminded herself. This was not about Stires, or making a grand show for the jury. This was about the truth.

"Do you remember in Guatemala, we were standing in the middle of a mass grave, being guarded by soldiers. We knew they were probably the same soldiers who had killed the people we were digging up. I was just a student. I was scared. I turned to you and I asked, what do we do?"

"That was a different place, and a radically different context."

"You said, 'We tell the truth. We do not flinch.' You flinched, Michael."

When heat increases inside of a closed system, so does pressure. This is why the lid on a covered pot of boiling water rattles, from pressure lifting it just enough to let some steam escape, and then the pressure is decreased just a bit and the lid's own weight pushes it back down into place. Brennan felt the pressure of holding back her own feelings increase as she testified. The emotions escaped in smaller words every now and then, but then the lid slammed shut and she kept going, boiling under the closed lid.

She had reverted to her own style of dress, listening this time to Booth because he'd told her to let the jury see who she really was. It was better, she thought, to be herself, to be true to herself. No performance, no acting. The explanations poured out, but shrouded in heavy words that masked the pain they described and put enough downward pressure on the rattling lid to keep it in place. She couldn't think about the pain. Immobilized sounded more distant than 'tied up.' Inflammation was impartial; infected felt personal and painful.

Tell the truth, but keep it impersonal. _It's not personal, it's not about me._ The sounds of the courtroom blurred and blended in her ears, as if she were under water. Levitts asked her questions, translating for her (she knew he was), and though Brennan tried to explain the science in smaller words, the closer she got to everyday feelings, the more they leaked out under the lifted lid and then she had to pull back again to slam the lid closed.

She was not being objective.

The jury would believe she'd made this all up, just as sleek Dr. Michael Stires had implied. _Stay detached,_ she warned herself. _Don't fail or Maggie will never get justice._

When Levitt asked her why she'd become a forensic anthropologist, the lid blew off.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Why did he ask her that? You think you know ... but maybe you don't. (Why yes, that is indeed an evil grin that I'm wearing as I type this tease.)


	10. Piercing the Armor

Author's Note: A very sincere thank you to all of the people who are reading this story, and especially to reviewers. I'm writing this story for you.

This chapter is dedicated to Mrs. Wright, my high school English teacher who is entirely to blame for the love/hate relationship I have carried on with Julius Caesar ever since we were first introduced. :D

* * *

~Q~

~Piercing the Armor~

~Q~

**For Brutus, as you know, was Caesar's angel.**  
** Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar lov'd him!**  
** This was the most unkindest cut of all;**  
** For when the noble Caesar saw him stab,**  
** Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' arms,**  
** Quite vanquish'd him: then burst his mighty**  
** heart. . . .**

_Julius Caesar, Act 3, Scene 2, Line 181_

~Q~

In the final days before the Costellos went to trial for the murder of Maggie Schilling, Booth invited Brennan to his office to meet with the District's prosecuting attorney and a jury consultant who promised she could groom any witness to jury-beloved perfection. It seemed she had decided Dr. Brennan needed a make-over.

"This is District Attorney Levitt. This is the Jury Consultant, Joy Deaver. And ... Doctor Temperance Brennan."

Wearing a false smile, Ms. Deaver shook Brennan's hand and waited impatiently while the prosecutor assured her the evidence provided looked solid. Before Brennan could finish saying 'thank you,' Deaver interrupted, the fake smile still pasted firmly on her disingenuous face. "But juries don't like you."

Brennan let out a shocked breath and a small laugh. "Excuse me?"

"I've seen you testify before, Dr. Brennan. You come off cold and aloof. I just want to make sure—"

Brennan's face fell. "Cold and aloof?" She sounded hurt.

Booth sat up straighter, shocked by the aggressive attack from the supposed 'people expert.'

"Try not interrupting," Deaver interrupted scathingly. "It makes you sound arrogant. Also, don't front-load your testimony with a lot of technical crap."

Booth's hands flew up, making a frantic 'don't-run-to-home-plate-because-it's-not-safe!' gesture. When that didn't get her attention, he spoke up. "This _really_ is not the best approach!" Not with Brennan. Not with anyone, actually, but especially not with Temperance Brennan.

Bewildered at the 'technical crap' comment, Brennan responded with confused clarity. "I'm a technical witness. I've testified in over 30 trials."

"But most of the experts you've come up against are as dry and boring as you are."

Brennan's brows nearly flew off her head in astonishment.

"Now, I don't know if you've seen their expert," Deaver gushed.

"She's seen him, Ms. Deaver," Booth cut in sharply, unafraid to interrupt and appear arrogant in front of this unpleasant woman. Oh yeah, Brennan had seen more of Stires than he ever wanted to think about.

"Well then you understand my concern. Professor Stires is …" and here she actually sighed dreamily " … open, charming, great looking. The jury's going to love him. **_I_** love him."

_Obviously_, Booth thought sourly. What in the world was wrong with that woman? He glanced at Brennan, noting how the love-struck mention of Stires had begun to annoy her, until it was halted by stunned disbelief rippling over her as she finally realized Ms. Deaver was advocating some kind of theatrical performance.

"This isn't a personality contest," she sputtered. "It's about data that we present to the jury."

Flatly, Deaver replied, "You're kidding. Right?"

Brennan shrugged, looking helplessly toward Booth, who shrugged back because as much as Brennan idolized the Truth, in a trial it was all about presentation. There was what ought-to-be, and there was reality: juries always went for the best performance and so did voters. The world runs on 'stupid' most of the time, and really, it's only getting worse.

Deaver continued her relentless assault. "The women on the jury aren't going to listen to a word that comes out of Dr. Stires's mouth. They're going to be undressing him. I don't want the men on the jury to be putting more clothes on _you_."

Brennan glanced down at herself, mystified. Booth was officially speechless.

"Wear something blue, it suggests truth. Make eye contact with the jury, and _lose_ the clunky necklace."

"Mary and Scott Costello murdered Maggie Schilling. The forensic data I've compiled proves that! That should be enough."

"But it isn't enough," Deaver countered rudely.

"Okay, _that's_ enough," having found his voice somewhere near his temper, Booth interrupted again by standing and bringing the verbal assault to an end. "That's great. We'll, uh, take that under consideration. Thanks." His firm dismissal suggested it was time for certain people to leave his office. Brennan could be a royal pain in his ... seat ... but that didn't mean he was going to sit there and let Deaver devour her self confidence. She wasn't that bad as an expert witness; so far they'd won convictions in every trial that resulted from a case they'd closed together.

Oddly confident that he didn't intend to kick her out as well, Brennan held herself in check until they left. She was frozen in a defensive pose, arms crossed and face expressionless. The moment the door shut, she launched herself into agitated motion. "Why didn't they say anything about _you_? You can be very irritating sometimes."

For once, he didn't let his hackles rise because he knew she didn't mean it. In fact, it rather warmed him to realize Brennan was venting with him, that she trusted him enough to let him see her upset. A few months ago she would have stayed cold and silent. Liking the thaw, he knew it might all come to a cold end if he voiced what she probably didn't want to hear. Sighing, he wondered if there was any way to distill the useful information hidden in that nasty heap of denigration Deaver had dumped on Brennan so that he could convince his partner to at least pay attention to the useful tips.

"Bones, she's an expert. Just like you."

Okay, Deaver was not just like Brennan, Booth thought to himself. He actually _liked_ Brennan. _Liked_? a snide little voice questioned. Yeah, liked. Definitely he liked Brennan, and that's why he added, "She has an obvious _personality disorder_, but she wants to help."

Brennan slowed her pacing, the personality disorder remark reassuring her.

"Just … try?" He begged.

"Okay," she sighed reluctantly, eyes downcast and he could tell the impact of Deaver's criticism lingered, settling into her even as she lifted her eyes and vowed, "I can do it."

But she couldn't. With just three devastating personal attacks, Dr. Michael Stires destroyed her credibility on the witness stand.

~Q~

Booth loitered outside the door for a full ninety seconds before gathering his courage and entering to make his request. "Angela, I need your advice."

"I charge a fee to make love connections," she asserted with a teasing smile. "A stud like you shouldn't need advice, though."

"This is serious," he said heavily, dropping onto her couch as if pushed by a great weight. "You were there today when Brennan testified."

"Yeah," she confirmed.

"Bones is losing the jury," he said slowly, feeling a sting of disloyalty for even thinking it. "She used too much technical jargon, her voice was flat, she didn't really make eye contact. She's always clinical in the trials we've done together, but this time it was worse than usual."

"I noticed," Angela prompted, waiting for the actual question.

"I tried telling her, you know, let the jury see who she really is. She just … she thinks that stiff performance up there is the real her. It's not. God." Booth pushed an agitated hand over his face. "If she can't connect with the jury, the Costellos are going to be acquitted."

"You've never worried about that before," Angela pointed out. Brennan's testimony had never failed before; clearly something was different this time and Angela had plenty of suspicions.

"Yeah, well, this time Michael Stires got up there and questioned her motive and her competence. He made her look like a vindictive harpy more interested in showing up her former professor than in finding the truth."

Booth swallowed a gulp of dismay, still feeling the way Brennan had stiffened on the bench beside him when Michael Stires had oozed out that oily comment. _'With respect to my former student, __Dr. Brennan, __with findings like these_ (made up, invented, was the implication), _I don't know why she became a forensic anthropologist. She seems to have ignored all but her preconceived notions about the case.'_ Then he'd gone on, _'Sometimes doctors can use data to confuse a very simple situation. I mean, I'm a doctor and I could hardly follow her.'_ And then the coup de grace, the suggestion that Brennan _'used big words to sound smart.'_ She'd gone pale, her eyes closing in palpable pain, and Seeley Booth felt his own heart pound in sympathy and barely throttled ire. It was wrong, so damn wrong, to betray a friend the way Stires had with a low, personal blow. In public, no less.

"She's begged me to give her another opportunity on the witness stand, but the prosecutor is afraid she's only going to end up looking worse."

Worse for Brennan or worse for the chances of conviction? Angela regarded the agent cautiously, wondering how far 'in' he was with Brennan. The two were bickering as much as ever, but the seething current of hostility that marked their earliest battles had dissipated into something more like operatic sexual tension. But right now? He looked heartsick.

"Booth, what advice are you looking for?"

"You and I both know she's not vindictive, that she's after justice for Maggie. How do I show the jury that?"

It wasn't at all what she'd expected. Angela hesitated, knowing what he could do, exactly how he could expose her. She felt sick even thinking of telling him how it could be done so easily. "This is for Maggie?"

He nodded, then sighed and seemed tired. "It's for Bones, too. I don't like people thinking she's cold."

That's what persuaded her, that soft defense that proved he'd gotten a glimpse beneath the armor. Booth was starting to know the real Temperance Brennan, starting to sense the storms that raged hidden under icy eyes.

So she told him what he needed to know. "You need to break her."

"What?" His eyes widened, his face turning quizzy green from not a lack of understanding, but a lack of will.

Angela entrusted Brennan's heart to him by handing him the hammer that would break the ice. "Betray her."

"No," Booth gasped. Horror swept over him at the very thought, because betrayal and perfidy went against his very nature. What Stires had done … how could Angela suggest he do it too?!

Even if he weren't quite so honorable, there was also the question of self interest. Booth knew Brennan well enough by now to have no doubt that deliberately betraying her would be too damaging. He'd made one wrong comment once before—unintentional—and she had stopped speaking to him for a year. If he hurt her on purpose, she would never speak to him again. The rift would be as permanent as the one that separated God from the Devil.

He could not do that, would not damage her in such a cruel fashion, no matter what the justification. There had to be some other way.

"You need to do it when she's on the witness stand," Angela continued relentlessly. "Hit her so hard and so deep she can't recover. Bring up her parents and her past on the witness stand. She's so fragile now the shield will break, everything she is will be exposed. You'll see it then, everyone in the room will."

"Angela…"

"But you need to know this," she cautioned. "Once you see her, you will never be able to walk away. You'll fall in love with her, just like I did. Are you prepared for that? There's no going back."

"What…?" Angela was in love with Brennan? He knew he must look foolish, his mouth open as his thoughts tumbled like dried leaves in the wind.

Her bawdy side took a back seat to the platonic just this once, (though the prospect of messing with Booth was almost too tempting to pass up). "There's more than one way to love somebody. Get your mind out of the gutter, Booth."

"What? No!"

Angela almost laughed. The flush staining his cheeks was cute, she had to admit, but there was a far more serious matter at hand. "You haven't seen that side of her. If you do what I tell you, you will see it."

"What will I see?"

"Beauty," she said. Such a simple word. "And magic."

He laughed. "Bones doesn't believe in magic."

"Haven't you ever wondered how she does it?" Angela challenged. "Have you ever asked her how we reconstruct faces, how she seems to read bones like they're books? Haven't you been curious?"

Meeting her challenge with his own quizzical stare, he nodded. Yes, he'd been curious. Yes, he'd even asked. He'd asked her about Cleo, and a few other times since then. Brennan had never given him a clear answer.

So Angela offered an explanation that explained nothing. "She sees their faces."

"Yeah, she said that. Something about underlying architecture." He shrugged, figuring it was some sort of biology/anatomy thing.

"No, I mean she sees _them_. Like, their essence or something."

An exasperated huff. "No, she doesn't."

"Yes, she does. And the way that I know that she does, is because I see them, too. That's why she hired me."

"You missed Halloween by a month," he scoffed, starting to lose his patience.

"I'm serious," she insisted.

"You're seriously telling me you and Brennan see ghosts? Like in Sixth Sense?"

Angela pondered that a moment, then shook her head. "Not like that, no. I'm not sure sometimes whether I'm seeing their literal face, or just filling in the details based on the architecture. That's the way Brennan describes it. I know she senses something, but she will be the first one to insist it isn't a ghost. At least, not in the sense of a disembodied soul, or wandering spirit. It's something that she seems to hear, or maybe she feels it in the bones. Have you watched her?"

Booth had begun pacing, but at the question he halted and froze as if Angela had just caught him staring. He sighed. "Yeah, I've watched her. She's …." And he shook his head, words failing him.

"She's mesmerizing," Angela supplied, "Right? The fluid way she moves … she strokes the bones like she's loving them and the bones speak to her when she touches them. It's like she goes into a trace; she doesn't eat or sleep and you can't get her attention easily. When she gets really lost, or really distant and impossible to reach, that's when she's remembering."

The certainty in Angela's tone caught him by his gut, splicing hints and truths into a nightmare possibility. Remembering what, exactly...? Dreading the answer, he prompted Angela for more. "Remembering?"

"She remembers what they've been through," Angela explained. "All that clinical jargon, the wall of words, the way she seems to feel nothing, that's how she protects herself when she's trying to push the feelings back. The reason she was so bad on the jury stand today is because she's trying not to relive Maggie's death. Literally, she's lived it. You understand?"

"No." Nothing Angela had said made any sense.

He stared at the black and white crucifixion painting that always caught his eye, a post-modern rendering of sacrifice. Red and ocher smeared over the edges, closing in on the sacrificial victim like blood-tinged fingers. It seemed such a dark piece, so unlike Angela's sunny personality. Why had she painted it, what did it mean? The sense it invoked in him, of being enclosed in hostility, isolated, made him shudder and turn away. "You're saying, what, that she was handcuffed and locked in a closet once?"

She watched him study the painting, the one she'd painted the night Brennan had told her about the car trunk. He was so close to correct, but it wasn't her place to tell him what that painting was about. Deliberately not answering his query, she kept explaining what needed to happen. "Michael Stires just hit her hard and added to the pain, so she's using all of her defenses to hold the memories back. Call her cold and heartless, betray her, and she'll drop the defense. You'll see Tempe."

Angela had come to stand beside him, taking his arm to bring his attention fully onto her. "And when you do, you will never be able to leave her. If you can accept that price, then betray her. I promise you, she'll forgive you."

"How do you know? She still hasn't forgiven me for last year."

"Because you're doing it for Maggie. She'll forgive you anything if it brings justice to Maggie."

~Q~

The second time on the witness stand was no better than the first. In fact, it was worse. The importance of this final bid for clarity was not lost on Brennan, yet she held herself back even more than she had before. As the unending stream of medicalese flowed out of her, the detachment formed a hazy and impenetrable wall between Brennan and everyone else. She was losing the jury again, and when the Prosecuting attorney, Levitt, turned to Booth with a helpless question of a glance, Booth nodded deliberately.

They'd already worked this out that morning.

"Dr. Brennan? Why did you become a forensic anthropologist?"

"What?" She stopped her spiel, looked stunned at the unexpected and baffling question.

"There must be some reason you chose this profession out of the hundreds of those available to someone of your intelligence. An emotional reason, perhaps?"

She was mute for a moment, sensing that he'd lifted a sledge hammer and was advancing on her without mercy. Equally flummoxed was the rest of the courtroom and the defense. "Objection! Relevance?"

Brennan turned to plead with the Judge as well. "I don't see how this pertains," she began as wicked fear licked at the edges of her control.

Levitt broke in ruthlessly, treating her essentially as a hostile witness. "Doctor Brennan is cold, distant and alienating, Your Honor."

"Hey!" Brennan gasped sharply. The verbal blows hammered divots into the surface, digging out fist-sized chunks.

"I need the jury to understand _why_ she's so cold, so that they might be willing to accept her testimony."

Laughing in contempt, the defense attorney snarked his protest. "Her personality issues are not relevant to this case."

Another blow, unwitting and therefore all the more effective. Brennan's face blanched.

Whirling, Levitt dashed out, "They opened up this line of questioning, Your Honor. When Dr. Stires was on the stand, he wondered why Dr. Brennan became a forensic anthropologist. So the defense must have thought it had some relevance then."

Judge Lang shrugged without sympathy. "Sorry, Mr. Meredith. You did raise the issue. Over-ruled."

"Dr. Brennan."

As she turned her dazed, bleak countenance towards Levitt, it was clear that in the last few moments a gaping hole in the wall of Dr. Temperance Brennan had opened, flashing the courtroom's first glimpse of Tempe, the orphaned waif. The abused foster child. The girl nobody liked or wanted.

Booth felt his conscience being torn to shreds as the attacks on her mounted and her defenses were ruthlessly stripped away. Her naked soul quavered in the courtroom, her eyes glowing silvery with pain.

"Your parents disappeared when you were fifteen, and no one has ever found out what happened to them. Isn't that correct?"

Those haunted eyes turned his way, shattered in the realization that he was the author of this moment, and as they landed on him he shattered as well. _Et tu, Booth?_ Her pain wrapped around him and the guilty pressure in his chest became unbearable. Angela's warning thundered in the cadence of his heart, pounding out the fear that he'd gone too far.

Unconsciously, Booth's fingers wrapped so tightly around the poker chip he carried that it cut into his flesh. The sickening anticipation of this gamble would surely quell the urge from now on, he decided. Even if the gamble paid off and Brennan found favor with the jury, he was going to lose her. He would never be able to leave her, and she was never going to forgive him.

Judge Lang instructed, "Answer the question, Dr. Brennan."

Temperance rallied, putting up a brave front. "That's correct."

"It must have been very painful. Is it fair to say that you've been trying to solve the mystery of their disappearance your whole life?"

"Do I want answers? Yes. As to how that influences my behavior, which I assume is what you're trolling for, I don't put much stock in psychology." She was repairing the breach rapidly, retreating back behind the icy walls.

"Is that why you wrap yourself up in techno-speak?" Levitt smashed into her again. "So you don't have to feel how these victims remind you of your own parents?"

"How I feel doesn't matter. My job doesn't depend on it." But she had lost her bravado. _Not my parents ... __**me**__. She is me. It could have been me.  
_

"But it's informed by it," Levitt insisted. "Or are you as cold and unfeeling as you seem…?"

The wall trembled and shook from that blow, when she realized why Booth had done it. Let them see the real you, he'd implored. And he'd given her the way, the story that didn't expose her compromised objectivity about Maggie quite so much. Her eyes flicked to Angela, noting the way the artist's eyes lowered in shame, and a dagger ripped through the last defense. The pressure squeezed her in from all sides, compression binding her limbs and trapping her in isolation. The unkindest cut was this one, when she understood her best friend was behind Booth's betrayal.

Booth was watching her struggle and had to force himself to meet her anguished gaze, but the moment the wall fell, he was transfixed. Dr. Brennan had disappeared.

There she was, shy Tempe with the black garbage bag full of the few things she'd managed to grab before the State of Illinois dragged her out of her home and threw her in with strangers. Torn Tempe who trudged to school in used clothes and dodged taunts and blows, lost and alone in the halls of a strange school. Homeless Tempe, who had no family, no friends, no place that wanted her. Battered Tempe, bruised and forgotten in the dark for two days while the pressure sore grew infected.

It was all in her eyes, all the hurt and hopelessness as she looked at a room full of enemies and felt herself alone.

When she opened her mouth, it was Tempe who spoke. And she was beautiful. Even in this moment, reeling with the three betrayals that had shattered her, she defended someone else.

"I see a face on every skull. I can look at their bones and tell you how they walked, where they hurt. Maggie Schilling is real to me. The pain she suffered was real. Her hip was being eaten away from infection from lying on her side. Sure, like Dr. Stires said, the disease could have contributed to that if you take it out of context. But you can't break Maggie Schilling down into little pieces. She was a whole person who fought to free herself. Her wrists were broken from struggling against the handcuffs. The bones in her ankles were ground together because her feet were tied. And her side—her hip and her shoulder—were being eaten away by infection. And the more she struggled, the more pain she was in, so they gave her those drugs to keep her quiet! They gave her so much it killed her. These facts can't be ignored or dismissed because you think I'm … boring or obnoxious. Because, I don't matter. What I feel doesn't matter. Only _she_ matters. Only Maggie!"

Booth could not take his eyes off her, no matter how much his guilty conscience screamed in revolt. With sickening clarity he realized what the white figure meant in Angela's painting, what Angela knew about Temperance Brennan that had inspired it. _'You'll fall in love with her,'_ Angela had warned.

And in that moment, he did.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: It's the little details that make writing a story like this one so much fun. At the moment Brennan's wall goes down, the camera flashes very briefly to Angela and I swear she looks so ... guilty. Hmmm...

After three betrayals like that, there has to be some repercussions.


	11. The Monuments at Night

Author's Note: This is one of my favorite chapters, partly because of the conversation and partly because the National Mall is one of my favorite places on earth. Each monument has its own unique personality, so to speak.

* * *

~Q~

~The Monuments at Night~

~Q~

**Though with their high wrongs I am struck to th' quick,  
Yet with my nobler reason 'gainst my fury  
Do I take part. The rarer action is  
In virtue than in vengeance. They being penitent,  
The sole drift of my purpose doth extend**  
**Not a frown further.**

_The Tempest, Act V, Scene 1, line 25-30_

~Q~

The scent of over-cooked meat competed with lighter fluid, a macabre barbeque played out on a scaffold ten stories above the Washington DC skyline. The wind cut around the Washington Monument, whistling in her ears and whipping strands of hair around her face so viciously she wished she'd remembered to bring a hair tie. At least the tyvek jumpsuit provided wind-breaking protection as well as immunity from stains and other filth.

"Listen, you want my coat or something? It's cold up here." Booth stood over the blackened body in his long, black overcoat, watching her with extreme caution.

"If I did, I'd ask for it," she snapped.

He backed off in record time; the first instance of 'backing off' she'd ever witnessed in him, come to think of it. "I'm sorry."

Brennan flicked her eyes away, still angry, and dug purposely in her tool bag. _'I'm not in a forgiving mood,'_ she'd muttered not an hour ago. Only the promise of a corpse at such proximity to the Jeffersonian's doorstep had drawn her out with the object of her enmity on this bitter November night.

"And, I'm sorry." This was soft, barely discernible over the whistling wind. He gave her a pleading glance, contrition etched in lowered brows and the slight droop of his lips. This apology had nothing to do with his coat, or his perceived chauvinism.

He'd said 'nothing personal' as he lamely justified slicing her open in public, flaying her family history and emotions as a spectacle intended to draw sympathy from the idiots in the jury box. Michael had said something like that, also. Nothing personal. And both had apologized. So far she had only accepted one of the apologies, partially, just enough to be standing here beside him when she'd much rather be alone in her office.

A whiff of fumes from the burnt body focused her on the real reason she was here: someone was murdered, his bones still groaning from the heat. Booth had the same goal she did: find out who, find out what, maybe even find out why. Find justice.

She straightened to look back at Booth, and noticed that he was waiting for her to make a decision. She was furious and still raw, yet couldn't help admiring that he would bend every rule of partnership for the sake of a girl he'd never met. He'd done what he thought would work. If there was going to be a casualty, better it be Temperance Brennan than Maggie Schilling's parents and Maggie herself. A reluctant sigh ghosted across her lips because she knew he hadn't acted out of either malice or self-promotion.

"You had something to accomplish, and you found a logical way to get what you needed." That was the whole picture: he was ruthless in his own way and thus she had found herself the casualty of Booth's drive for justice. If she could frame it that way, she could find a route to forgiveness. So with the barest hint of a smile Temperance Brennan used what she'd learned from Seeley Booth and deliberately offered him the comfort of a lie. "I probably would have done the same thing."

He looked relieved, his eyes soft and sorry. Brennan wondered how Booth had the power to crush her and yet she let him return unscathed so many times. Why did she keep forgiving him? Did she have an incipient tendency towards masochism, or was there something else at play?

Before she could follow that train of thought Booth had turned his attention back to the business at hand. Gesturing to the burnt body, he asked, "So, what happened here?"

Ultimately she was grateful for the distraction if it would give her more time to ruminate. Brennan knelt carefully beside the fragile bones and charred meat. "The degree of charring suggests exposure to extremely high temperatures. Nearly all the soft tissue has burned away from his trunk and extremities. Details of the skull are still obscured so I can't be sure of race." But his Caucasian features flickered like dying flames over the blackened bone. Pointing out the charred staining against the white marble of the Monument, Brennan suggested a cause for her difficulty. "He was burned here for some reason."

"A political statement, maybe." Booth shook his head and glanced down towards the Lincoln Memorial glowing softly white a mile away. "The question is, how did he get up here?"

Brennan's gloved fingertips gently hovered over the cranium and skimmed lightly over a faint depressed fracture over the right temporal. He was hit first, then he was tied to the scaffold and set on fire with accelerant brought to the scene. Fumes seared her nostrils, followed by low moans and crackling flames. She shivered and blamed it on the wind.

"He walked up here," she volunteered. He wasn't dead when the fire started, but the blow had stunned him to nearly unconscious.

"By himself?" Booth frowned.

Brennan shook her head, still gazing at the body. "No, with the killer. He was hit in the head." She pointed out the skull fracture. "The killer was left-handed."

"How do you know that?" Was that amazement she heard in his query?

Brennan lifted her left arm, mimicking a swing at the skull but stopping short of hitting it on the skull's right side, above where the ear would be located. "Left handed."

Booth shook his head, apparently having not yet reached the point of complete trust in her abilities. "Couldn't he have been hit from behind?"

"No. The bone around the point of impact bends inward away from the direction of force." She gestured to the depression again, able to see the path of the blow quite clearly despite the charred flesh that would need to be teased away.

"So … somebody walks up here with this guy, clocks him upside the head, ties him up, and sets him on fire?"

Brennan nodded absently. That's what the bones were telling her. "He's still warm." Abruptly she checked her watch before grabbing a thermometer out of her bag and thrusting it into the remnants of the abdomen. They might need a core temperature.

Booth winced and turned away with a shudder. "Yeah. The DC Fire Department responded to the report of a fire up here an hour ago and got quite a surprise waiting for them."

Uneasy at the ideas forming in her mind, Brennan glanced down at the crowd of people ringing the monument and straining their necks to get a clear view. From this far up, she could see the World War II Memorial flood-lit in amber light, and beyond that the ghostly white of the Lincoln Memorial a mile away. "The fire would have been visible from as far away as the Lincoln Memorial once it really got going. In the time it would take someone to notice and call 911 to report it, the killer would have had ample time to exit the scaffold. Someone might have seen him." _Or her_, Brennan added mentally, but she knew the killer was statistically more likely to be male.

Pausing to consider what she'd said, he glanced upwards, sideways, and down over the edge of the scaffold. When he finally looked back to her an odd expression had entered his eyes. "What are the chances he could still be down there...?"

Brennan shrugged. Anything was possible, but speculation was Booth's specialty.

"Nobody is that stupid," he decided. Another long pause for thought, then, "What did he hit our victim with? Any ideas?"

"A flashlight." The answer tumbled out of nowhere, yet clearly it was possible. Brennan measured the width of three fingers over the length of the depressed fracture that she could just barely make out on the desiccated skull. "Probably it carries C or D sized batteries. Oh, and he'll smell like lighter fluid."

Booth shook his head, laughed a little, and walked a few steps away to call in a description: a left-handed person, probably male, carrying a large flashlight and smelling like a charcoal briquette just before ignition.

Retrieval didn't take very long, and a little more than an hour later Brennan had packed her tools away in the medico-legal truck after divesting herself of the coverall. She had just finished directing two crime scene technicians on how to handle the remains once they arrived at the Jeffersonian when she felt an almost gravitational pull that meant Booth was rejoining her. She glanced up into a peculiar smile, one that was twisted half in amusement, half in disbelief.

"The strangest thing about this job is being amazed over and over again at how profoundly stupid people can be."

"I thought it was wrong to call people stupid." She was fairly certain of that social nicety, even without Booth to tell her so.

"To their faces, yes. Behind their backs when they're dumb enough to hang around the crime scene with the murder weapon in hand, not so much. Come on, let's get some coffee."

Startled at the offer, Brennan let him push her away from the truck with a broad palm at her lower back. When had he started doing that? And why did she like it, the minor possession his courtly act implied. It felt nice, which was unnerving because it should be aggravating. She shook her head, focusing on logistics instead of the steady warmth teasing her spine. "Don't you have to process the arrest?"

"Nope. The National Mall falls under the jurisdiction of the District One US Park Police. It's not my case."

"Then, why are you here?"

He bent toward her with a friendly nudge. "I'm here because of _you_."

"I don't understand." It didn't help that he was giving her that grin again. Brennan was starting to hope it would be possible to develop an immunity to it. Eventually she would have to, otherwise she was destined to lose all sense and reason whenever he turned it on and that would give him an unacceptable advantage.

Booth laughed, and it sounded rather fond (not that she had any way of objectively knowing that). "We're a package deal, Bones. When someone asks for you, they get me too. And when someone asks for me, they're always gonna get you."

"Why?" She asked blankly.

"Because we're partners."

But partners didn't betray each other, did they?

Settling into a moderate pace beside him, Brennan let her thoughts wander as they worked their way to the World War II Memorial. The brightly illuminated circle of fountains splashed noisily in front of a wall bearing over 4000 golden stars. A ring of 56 pillars curved around them, one for every state and territory, and two larger pavilions stood sentry at each end. One pavilion stood for the Atlantic theater and one for the Pacific. The entire edifice glowed amber against the starless night sky, brilliant and peaceful; lovely, as if the classic design was meant to obscure the horrors it commemorated.

Booth halted at the fountains, gazing thoughtfully ahead at the wall of stars where each single star represented 100 deaths. He knew the golden stars had a deeper meaning than a simple graphic display of lives lost. "My grandfather told me that during World War Two, families proudly sent their sons off to fight. Sometimes their daughters, too. Families had hand-made flags that hung in the front window with stars on it. Blue stars for every member of the family that was serving their country, serving Liberty; and a gold star for every lost life. The sacrifice was painful, but worth it."

She glanced up at him curiously. This was a point on which they differed: Brennan had never understood or condoned war. Here in the United States the war simply caused discomfort from rationing and the separation of loved ones. In Europe and Asia, it had been different because it had been War. The killing was senseless, and ... and there was only one word to capture the devastation, _chaos_, but that word didn't speak loudly enough. It didn't scream the truth of war, only whispered it in soft consonants. Murder, rape, violence, cities burning, homes destroyed, crops crushed, people displaced and starving. Corpses piled up to rot, their stench unbearable. The horror she dug out of the ground because of wars proved to her just how awful war was. It should never be glorified.

"Sometimes we sacrifice something precious for a greater good," he said softly.

And she understood: there was always an ulterior motive with Seeley Booth. It made her eyes burn and her head ache, understanding what he was trying to say in this roundabout way. "So I get a gold star?" she asked bitterly.

"You should get a monument."

"You know why people build monuments?" she asked tightly. "It's because they feel guilty."

Maybe that's why they offer their coats and cups of coffee, too. Brennan rolled herself away, striding past the brilliant amber lights and into the darkness of the footpath that would lead her away from empty gestures. Maybe wars shouldn't start in the first place. Maybe people should try a little harder to find another way to get what they need. Her angry stride set a fast pace into the shadows and when she was finally swallowed up in the darkness she knew so well Brennan breathed easier. He was still there, flanking her, driven by shame and misplaced chivalry.

"I'm not some damsel in distress." Brennan stopped abruptly, turning to glare at him though he was barely visible. "I don't need your guilt or your pity."

"I know that." He was placating her.

Another furious puff of air passed her lips as Brennan stormed away again. She'd thought she had forgiven him at the Washington Monument. It was easy when she could tell herself he was just another pragmatic cop who had worked the end-justifies-the-means method to get his case convicted. Nothing personal, right? Betrayed by a work acquaintance who didn't like her very much anyway? So what. She could shrug that off like dead leaves falling, blown away with a toss of her shoulder.

Now he was offering apologies and justifications she hadn't counted on, his conscience riding him. He was acting as if he cared and somehow that made it all worse. Betrayed by a friend? That hurt. He couldn't be a friend, he couldn't be a partner and do the things he'd done. It would all be easier if he didn't care, because then she wouldn't have to, either.

"I don't believe you," she said after another few minutes. They'd covered half the distance to the Lincoln Memorial and in the cover of the isolated footpath under the trees she stopped to wipe a tear away. "We're not partners."

The silent warmth of him came to a halt just behind her, quietly compelling her to expel the hurt into the darkness while her face was hidden. It wouldn't stay in, wouldn't stay down where she'd interred it, and under the cover of night she let it claw its way out of her. "Partners are equals, they respect each other. You think I don't know how often you manipulate me? You've been manipulating me from the beginning, like I'm a tool for you to use and discard. You laugh at me, insult me, and then tell _me_ I'm terrible with people? You act like I don't have feelings but I _do_, Booth."

His voice was soft, and sounded a little ashamed. "I know, Bones."

Bones. Hard and so often dead once she got to them. He kept calling her that, dehumanizing her, because to Booth bones were always dry and dead, boring. But to Brennan, they lived, they pulsed with life and vitality. Living bone is nature's art, completely replacing and sculpting itself two or three times each year. Our entire skeletons are completely remodeled at least once every six months, taken apart and rebuilt right under our skins. Even the dead bones she touched still held the stories of the lives they'd supported and they felt alive to her. Booth didn't know that, she suspected. He didn't know how alive the bones were.

"You keep calling me that. I have a name."

"I'm sorry, Temperance."

"It hurts." Everything hurt. Losing her parents hurt. Being trapped in the dark and feeling Maggie's pain, becoming a sacrifice on the altar of justice and shrinking under the pitying glances of strangers hurt. The betrayal of her former teacher, mentor, and lover hurt. Booth's betrayal and Angela's obvious involvement hurt. It all hurt ... and she just wanted it all to stop. And in that muffled truth he must have heard how close to the limits of human endurance she had gotten.

Out of the darkness his hands crept over her arms and turned her and she felt herself being wrapped in warmth. His warmth, gentle and slightly spicy, buffered her from the cold wind and soothed the ache in her. She didn't want to accept it, the way he could make her feel pain and then make her forgive him with offerings of warmth. Coats, coffee, an embrace in the dark.

And an apology that might be sincere, but what if it wasn't.

She didn't want to accept the risk of forgiving him only to be betrayed again somewhere down the line. The only thing that persuaded her to try was the fact that he'd even said the words, 'I'm sorry.' If he meant them, it gave power to her that she'd never had before. It was the first time anyone had ever truly asked for her forgiveness with the tacit understanding that she was under no obligation, the first time she'd been given the option of extending it or not. All the hurts she'd suffered in her life had come like cold, hard slaps from people who didn't care if she forgave them. They were already gone by the time she caught her breath. Now here was someone who finally stayed and acted as if her decision mattered; she was getting the sense that she could turn her back and cut him off and it would hurt him.

His apology rumbled under her ear. "I know. I'm sorry."

Sometimes all we need is for someone to admit they've hurt us. Sometimes that's all it takes. Shuddering out a small sob, she buried her face in his coat and choked back all the emotion that she wasn't ready to release to him. His arms tightened around her, holding her together until she could hold her own. The firm embrace held her broken pieces like a cast holds bone, giving her time to start reconnecting the scattered parts and make the repairs that could restore her strength. Standing inside the circle of his arms felt more soothing and peaceful than she ever would have imagined and she was tempted to stay there where the darkness hid them and all the rules seemed suspended.

But that could only last for a few minutes if they were going to be partners. When she finally lifted her head, pushing him back, it came with a softly uttered plea. "Don't do it again."

"I won't," he promised.

Time would tell if he would keep the vow, but for now it was enough. She stepped away from him, grateful for the darkness and the cover of trees. Soft voices from tourists walking along the Reflecting Pool drifted to them as wisps of conversation and over their heads, the last straggling leaves chattered in the breeze. Brennan lifted her hands to her cheeks, covertly removing the traces of her feelings, and when she was ready they both began to walk the path side by side.

"I'm still going to call you 'Bones,'" he said when they reached the end of the path.

"Why," she demanded.

Considering his answer very carefully, Booth reached for her elbow and tucked his fingers around it. He guided her the last little way out of the shadowy path and into the light. "Because what you do with bones is amazing. It's like magic."

"It is not magic, it's years of training and excellent memory recall coupled with keen observation."

"It is magic," he countered with a grin.

"It is not."

"Is too."

She scowled. "There's no such thing as magic."

As they left the footpath, light spilled over his mischievous face and caught the teasing glint in his eyes. "Oh yes, there is magic."

Captured in the pull of his orbit, she felt her body humming and her mind whirling with ideas best never expressed. What he could do to her with just a look bordered on magic, yet she knew there was a perfectly rational explanation for the feelings. Hormones. Biological imperatives whispered his suitability as a mate even as her more highly evolved homo-sapient frontal cortex attempted to assert itself and remind her that he was off limits and she still wasn't even sure if she trusted him.

Self preservation was what pulled her back from the event horizon. She crossed her arms, hoping the barrier would hold. "To the Xhosa! of Namibia, a flashlight would seem like magic, but we both know there's a perfectly non-magical explanation for how it works."

He smirked. "Yeah, they think Coke bottles are magic, too."

Brennan's face crumpled into complete bafflement, which only made him laugh. "Come on, Bones, 'The Gods Must be Crazy?'"

"My money's on _you_ being the crazy one," she muttered.

"It's a movie. You seriously need to get that TV fixed."

The Lincoln Memorial beckoned brightly ahead, a white marble temple dedicated to ideals like emancipation and unity. There was a coffee cart tucked under the edge of the trees where the Reflecting Pool ended, still open despite the relatively late hour. The only reason the two stopped bickering was the need to order their drinks and with the momentum lost they each left off with reluctance. In silence they waited for the coffees. Once the steaming cups were in hand, Booth and Brennan ascended the marble steps and stood together in front of Abraham Lincoln.

"Does it bother you to come here?" she asked softly.

"No." He had stiffened at the question. Booth's eyes were shadowy under the harsh lights but he gave her the benefit of a real answer. "I come here when I need to remind myself what matters."

"Is that why you're here tonight?"

Though it was late, tourists still swarmed in and out of the temple-like monument. Their voices pinged off the marble walls and left behind snippets of conversations like flung puzzle pieces:

"...bus, I saw..."  
"...next is the book-..."  
"...why can't we do the..."  
"...hold this for me..."  
"...went with..."

Cameras flashed miniature lightning bolts around them, making him blink as he turned to her. "We're here tonight because that coffee cart has the best coffee in all of DC." He lifted his cup in salute, then turned and gestured again to the monuments on display, looming in double above the Reflecting Pool. "And that view is the best view in all of DC."

Brennan raised her brows half-way, because she couldn't decide whether to be amused or appalled. "_That's_ what matters most to you?"

When he answered, his words wrapped themselves around her like the coat she'd already rejected, like the embrace she'd accepted. The meaning warmed her more effectively than either the embrace from earlier or the coffee heating her hands at that moment. She'd never felt such a physical sensation from mere sound, as if he'd spoken an incantation rather than a simple explanation. "Tonight, you deserve the best, Bones."

It sounded like magic, the balm that would make everything just a little bit better between them.

He wasn't giving her the charm smile, and that was how she knew he meant it.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Aside from that cinematic pull-back from the body on the Washington Monument, we didn't get to explore that case at the end of Girl in the Refrigerator. I deliberately left the murder somewhat unresolved because sometimes Brennan must be called to investigate cases for local police forces, not just for Booth and the FBI. Fortunately for the police, many criminals are in fact breathtakingly stupid. That's how they get caught.

Thank you to all of the people reading this. I'm glad you're here. :D


	12. The Golden Rule in the Lab

Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who leaves me reviews. I am always very appreciative for every review that comes freely offered. Each one is special and I do try to thank every reviewer personally. For those who aren't signed in, I thank you as well. Your words brighten my day. :)

There's a bit of reprieve from the angst in this installment, but despite the calm, there's a lot going on.

* * *

~Q~

~ The Golden Rule in the Lab ~

~Q~

**What 's gone and what 's past help should be past grief**

_The Winter's Tale, Act 3, scene 2_

~Q~

The third time Brennan turned down an offer of going out, Angela knew she was feeling the consequences. She sighed, settling her handbag on the sofa's arm and plopping herself onto the sofa as if she had every intention of spending the night there. Waiting.

Brennan glanced over at her with a pestered flick of her chin, then studiously returned to her computer terminal. The mouse moved over a pad of paper, sending out occasional clicks, and that was the only sound in Brennan's office for a good ten minutes. Angela shifted her weight pointedly, but she might as well not even exist for all the impact she had. Brennan continued whatever subterfuge she was using to avoid the real issue and Angela had to reluctantly admire her ability to tune out distractions. The anthropologist was nothing if not focused, even when pretending she didn't know what was going on.

Finally, Angela cracked. "What's going on, Brennan."

"I have work to do."

Angela leaned forward, engaging battle despite her own reluctance to force a confrontation. "You're mad at me."

Brennan stilled for a moment, her head tilting in consideration of this novel concept. Ripples of movement played over her face, darkening her eyes as the thoughts traipsed past and were rejected each in turn. Then she shook her head as if giving up on something.

"Why do you think I am angry with you?" she finally asked, and the nearly genuine curiosity was what set Angela off balance.

"Are you saying you're not?" Angela asked pointedly.

That got her. Brennan turned her concentration further inwards and considered her options. She reviewed their interactions over the previous week and came up confused. "I've given you no reason to think I'm angry," she offered quietly.

Laughing, Angela shook her head. "You mean, because you didn't yell at me or call me a back-stabbing witch to my face, you've kept your feelings hidden?"

Utter confusion. That was the look Angela received from her friend, a genuine bafflement that was not feigned and for once, Angela didn't know what something meant. "You're feeling _something_, Brennan. What is it?"

"Self reproach."

Brennan wasn't angry, she didn't understand why Angela would think otherwise, but she was avoiding her... With a little gasp Angela finally understood, and it was the worst thing she could imagine. "You expected this, didn't you."

Restlessly, Brennan pushed back from her desk and busied herself with files that didn't need to be gathered up. "Why be angry at a scorpion for having a stinger? People lie and betray each other every day. I was foolish to forget that."

She decided to ignore the unflattering comparison. "Brennan, you're right in a way. But you're also wrong. This is where motive matters."

The sharp glance cut deep, like the sliver edge of a knife. "The ends justify the means. Very logical. I get it."

"No, you don't," Angela insisted. "It wasn't just about Maggie, it was for you, too."

A harsh, cynical laugh, and Brennan's anger finally spilled out. "How did that public humiliation benefit me?"

And now Angela was angry as well, but at the person who most deserved it. She jumped to her feet and faced Brennan with all the outrage Brennan couldn't seem to muster on her own behalf. "Because that two-faced bastard sat on the witness stand and _lied_ about you! He basically said you were incompetent and working your own agenda, and using big words to hide your mistakes. And they believed him, because he's got a silver tongue and a cute smile. That was just as much an injustice as letting two murderers go free."

"I don't care what people think of me!"

"Well, I _do_!" Angela stepped closer, furious at the quirk in Temperance Brennan that somehow hid her own worth from her. Deep down, Brennan did care or she wouldn't be so deeply wounded each time someone called her cold. Softening her stance, Angela continued, "I do care what people think of you. And so does Booth, that's why he came to me looking for a way to let you out of your own shell."

Pressing her teeth together to entrap her rebellious tongue, Brennan struggled to order her thoughts before the wrong one got out. The angriest ones beat against the enamel cage, determined to escape and wreck their havoc. The reasonable ones shrank back, overwhelmed and wondering what they'd done to be trampled so under her ire at Angela's well-meaning interference.

She was exhausted, from all the tumultuous feelings that Booth and Angela kept stirring up inside her. Everything was easier and quieter in the graves, among the softly whispering dead. _They_ couldn't hurt her, only the living could do that. Over and over again, the living ones hurt her and the only protection was staying away from treacherous beating hearts and sweetly flowing blood. 'You can always count on the dead,' she'd told Booth a few months ago. The cool, solid bones of the dead had never failed her.

Shells were like bones, made strong from calcium carbonate instead of calcium phosphate. Their hard, mineral solidity made a good shelter. "Maybe I don't want to go out," Brennan finally said, very softly. "Maybe I like it in here."

"Walling yourself up in a fortress is no way to live." Angela knew that's what she was doing, retreating inside higher walls, thicker ones. Walls without windows, rooms without doors. How was it any different than a living grave?

She switched off her computer, suddenly deciding Angela was partly right. Only partly. "I'm not coming out of here, but I will go out with you."

Angela nodded, taking the concession. Knowing that she had lost the larger part of Brennan's trust, this partial restoration was more than she'd expected to get. "Are you going to forgive Booth?"

Brennan had taken her coat and purse, and she paused next to her friend wearing a weary resignation. "I understand why you did it, Angela. That doesn't mean I like it."

"Things will be better between you two now," Angela promised, living on nothing but hope that she was right.

"Maybe." Brennan had a direct gaze that often pinned the subject of her scrutiny with discomfort. She did that to Angela now, pinned her with eyes that said she was no longer open. "But that's for us to work out on our own."

Understood, was the silent reply. Angela slung her own purse over her shoulder and started towards the exit with Temperance Brennan a half step behind her. Suddenly, the artist paused and pressed a hand on her friend's arm. "I just want you to know, you're the best friend I've ever had."

Her eyes shining brighter than stars, Brennan nodded and whispered, "Me, too." That's why it had hurt so much.

~Q~

As the churned up tensions slowly settled into a new configuration, a different source of woe seeped in between them. With a start, Angela realized that somehow it had become December and Brennan was short-tempered. She slammed into her office one Tuesday morning muttering under her breath.

"Sweetie, what's wrong?"

"Goodman declined my vacation request." She dumped a messy stack of files down onto the top of her desk and threw herself into a chair. "He says the case load is too heavy and I can't be spared. I already promised Dr. Haglund I'd go with him to Niger!"

Taking a seat across from the agitated anthropologist, the artist asked, "How long were you wanting to be gone?"

"As long as possible," Brennan muttered.

Though she didn't like the idea of Brennan leaving at all, Angela suggested Goodman might approve a shorter vacation. "Did you try asking for only a week off?"

"Of course," she snapped. "He said no vacation, period, except for a couple of days. The same days everyone else gets off. Christmas." She spat the word as if it left a bad taste in her mouth.

"The last time you left..." Angela ventured. Brennan's steely gaze flashed hard and bright, as if daring her to continue. Angela took a breath and dove in. "You came back, um, different. Maybe Goodman just doesn't want that to happen again."

Biting her lip, she jumped to her feet and jerked into her lab coat clumsily. "I'm not going to El Salvador. I wanted to go to _Niger_. It's an entirely different continent."

Right, as if there really was much of a difference between one blood-stained, war-torn country and another. Standing as well, following her rapid steps out and, why was she not surprised, to the doors of Limbo, Angela bravely pointed out, "You're safer here."

Brennan paused, her fist clenching against the frigid steel doorknob. She glanced back with the same crystalline eyes that haunted Angela's art. "No, I'm not." The door clanged shut behind her before Angela could think of anything to say.

And so their latest Tango began. Booth caught Brennan at lunch time more days than not, and Angela did her level best to keep her busy during the evenings. Some occasions were more successful than others, but the first real failure happened as that magic date on the calendar drew near and Angela attempted a holiday event. She'd started wearing on Brennan's defenses a week previous and thus far had not made much headway.

The afternoon arrived and Angela was still on a mission, determined to drag her best friend to the Jeffersonian's annual Christmas party. Brennan was equally determined to resist. "Sweetie, could you stop galloping for, like, two seconds?" Angela griped as she chased the anthropologist up onto the platform.

Whirling, Brennan retorted, "I'm better able to withstand peer pressure when you can't catch me."

Not giving up, Angela laid in with a Christmas list of reasons for why Brennan should go, the most striking one being her failure to prevent Angela from photocopying sensitive portions of her anatomy the previous year. Brennan reminded Angela she hadn't attended the party last year (El Salvador, remember? as if either of them would forget) and Angela continued to press with nary a flinch. All the more reason Brennan should go _this_ year.

There was a mindless exchange about secret satans while Brennan tugged on latex gloves and bent toward an unidentified skull she'd extracted from Modular Bone Storage ('Limbo,' Angela would have insisted). It was a male, she decided, still rather young. Brennan reached out, her fingers connecting with bone and features started to waver in front of her. Hazel eyes, she thought. A subtle, sideways smile.

"Now how am I going to enjoy this party knowing that my best friend in the whole world is in the lab, eyeball to eyeball with Skeletor."

"Who?" Brennan's vague question was proof that she was slipping away, falling into the black orbits.

"He's a cartoon villain who looks like … you know, his name is self-explanatory." She almost stamped her exasperated foot and nudged Brennan to get her attention. "Would you _please_ just come to this Christmas party?"

Pulled back out of the sounds whirling inside her head, called out by the hint of desperation, Brennan sighed. It had been a week and she really was tired of dodging all the pleading, foot stomping, pouting demands. She glanced at Angela and finally relented, just to make Angela happy. "Twenty minutes."

"Bones!" Booth flew in carrying an antique suitcase and breathless excitement.

Already delighted that she'd won the war with Brennan, Angela's good mood increased when the handsome FBI Agent came bounding in. She tossed out a hip and flashed him her flirtiest smile. "Merry Christmas, Seeley."

"Oh, wow." Booth approached Angela with more than a little interest as he beheld both the smile and the costume she was wearing. "What are you, an elf?"

Her flirty ways drew his best charm smile forth, making him almost forget why he'd come. Brennan took the proffered file and opened it because she'd suddenly realized it might give her the necessary excuse to avoid being dragged up to a party she had no desire to attend.

"Yes," she chirped. "What's wrong with a little Christmas spirit?"

Brennan, however, was not quite as blind as people tended to think. Her cool voice broke through the eye play. "What's the context?"

Torn over admitting to herself that the flirting bothered her or remaining safely disinterested, she pretended the reason for her brusque behavior was merely a desire to move things along. Angela stood tapping her tasseled toes impatiently while Booth rambled about bomb shelters and surprises like this one. He pointed to the photo of a fifty year old suicide victim found entombed and still wearing his porkpie hat. The right arm lay neatly over his sternum, still clutching a revolver.

Ah, the hope and promise of a diversion. "It's not a suicide," she informed him crisply.

"Why not?" Booth actually looked a bit panicked. "Hole in the head, you see the gun? It's a suicide."

She scoffed, flipping the file closed. "He shoots himself in the head and somehow his arm ends up across his chest? Bring the skeleton in, I'll _prove_ it wasn't a suicide." Lifting her eyes to meet his, what she found was a triumphant grin.

"Merry Christmas, Bones!" He turned as a piercing whistle burst out of his lips. The doors behind him opened and two FBI technicians entered with a body bag. "Come on, boys! Bring it in."

Angela protested. "We're going to the company Christmas party."

_Saved by the body,_ Brennan thought with immense relief. Schooling herself into calm resignation, she turned to Angela and advised, "You go ahead. I'll do a cursory examination and I'll meet you in a few minutes." And a few minutes might stretch into a few hours, she hoped. So grateful was she at this much-needed excuse, Brennan forgave her friend and partner for flirting with each other. Really, what did she care. Something like that didn't matter when there was this poor long-deceased man to look over and a company Christmas party to avoid.

Booth saw the skeleton neatly settled onto an examination table and turned to flee the scene. That, oddly enough, did matter. Quite a lot. What did he think he was doing, bringing her a corpse at closing time just before the Christmas holiday started, assuming that she would be there (okay, she was, but still...). And assuming that she would drop everything to look it over (okay, she had, but she might have had something better to do, like ... a Christmas party she didn't want to attend). Booth was assuming far too much if he thought all she lived for was to examine his corpses all day and all night (and yet, she felt the call of the bones).

She knew she would not be permitted to heed the call as long as Angela was there.

Furthermore, it was Booth's body, she thought with annoyance. If he wanted her help, he could help her in return. Sensing Angela's simmering irritation at this development that was going to deprive her of companionship at the Christmas party, and equally annoyed at Booth's effort to dump and run, Brennan seized upon a genius plot that would remove two annoyances at once. Angela had flirted with Booth and often remarked upon his physical attributes with more than artistic appreciation. Booth had just flirted back. (And that was _not_ why she was annoyed with him, she told herself firmly.)

"Booth. Would you escort Angela to the Christmas party, and make sure she doesn't photocopy her butt."

Angela lit up like a Christmas tree, but Booth was instantly stammering out excuses. "Oh no, I can't do that. I've got some very important last minute Christmas shopping that I've got to do."

Oddly, he was looking at Brennan while speaking, as if begging for her to release him, but now that she'd articulated such a clever solution her best friend was all over it. It was Angela who swooped in to capture his arm and pull him to his fate.

"It's not last minute until tomorrow," Angela delightedly informed him as she started to lead him away.

"Come on, Bones," he begged, still half turned her way.

Brennan merely raised a brow, but Angela had no mercy. "Come on," she cooed.

Watching them go, a small smirk danced at the edges of Brennan's composed features. What was the saying, catching two birds with one net? Something like that. Angela was happily attending the party, leaving Brennan off that hook. And Booth was going to suffer the consequences of thinking he could dump a murder on her after hours just because she worked all the time.

A moment later they were gone, leaving Brennan with bones that sighed and shuffled. He had been slight of stature with weak muscle attachments, suffered from mild khyphosis that would have left him stoop-shouldered, and his facial features were asymmetrical. She poked a tender finger at the gunshot wound that pierced his temporal, noting it had been a fairly small caliber and had entered cleanly perpendicular on the right. The wound on the left temporal was slightly beveled and bore small radiating fractures. It indicated he'd been shot from the side while standing or sitting and the gun held over 12 inches away which was not very likely in a suicide. Brennan frowned as she beheld the evidence that she was right.

"I knew you didn't kill yourself," she told him. A soft sigh filled her mind, rather like a cool breeze on a warm summer day.

This was not an exit but rather a second entrance wound. With great patience and skill, she extracted the bullet that was lodged on the left side and set it in a stainless steel receptacle. Suicides did not live long enough to shoot themselves twice.

His wizened features hovered mournfully in her mind's eye and when her hand made contact, she became enveloped in hope and sorrow. Long strings of numbers flowed through her mind, endless calculations, increasing values over time. Compelled in ways she couldn't explain, Brennan's hand drifted down his torso and felt blasted by heat when she reached his sternum. _Look_, it seemed to say. _My heart is there_. She cautiously reached inside his jacket and pulled out airplane tickets from 1959. Two tickets to Paris.

She wondered aloud, "Who was going to go with you?"

All of the hope of such a journey flared behind her eyes, steeping her in wonder. And that's how Booth found her.

"What have you got there?"

"Two open tickets to Paris, one way. Pan-Transit Airlines. They're blank."

"Pan Transit went out of business in the 60s."

The scratching heat was fading, the numbers falling silent, but Brennan was still very distracted. "I thought you were at the party."

"Oh," he groaned. "It wasn't a party, it was a Star Wars convention." He had eluded Angela by utilizing sniper skills like hiding behind ficus plantings and dashing down back stairways, but he knew she would discover his absence and launch a pursuit shortly.

Setting the tickets down gingerly, Brennan grasped a black metal slug with forceps and held it aloft. "This … was still in the skull."

Booth whistled appreciatively. "Twenty-two caliber, matches the gun he was holding. Did you open up the suitcase?"

"Nope."

"Why not?"

"It could hold information that would compromise my objectivity."

Sarcastic to the bitter end, Booth rolled his eyes. "Oh, yeah, like a name and address?"

"I prefer to make unbiased initial observations—is that pure alcohol?" Brennan's attention had shot like an arrow towards the upper catwalk when she noticed Hodgins leading Zack, both walking fast, and Hodgins failing to hide a large beaker that held a clear liquid.

Hodgins winced and paused, but Zack froze like prey caught in a trap. "Yes … Dr. Brennan." Hodgins turned and scowled at him fiercely.

"Do you really think Goodman's going to let you spike the eggnog after the Fourth of July fiasco?"

Hodgins sighed. "Oh… we may have to rethink."

Brennan knew how to nip their mischief in the bud. "Zack, I need you to clean these bones."

"Now?!"

Hodgins snickered. "Ha! Burned."

But Brennan wasn't finished. "And I need _you_ to search the clothing for insect evidence."

"Geeze, Bones," Booth exclaimed disapprovingly. "Merry _Christmas_."

He was a fine one to talk, having brought the body to them in the first place. Before she could remind him that _she_ was their boss and _he_ had no idea what kind of trouble those two would get up to if not kept busy, Angela burst through the doors and launched into a lecture of her own.

"Okay, you people listen to me. There is a party going on upstairs, okay? A Christmas party. We're going up there. We're going to talk to some people, we're going to sing some carols, we're going to drink some eggnog." She pointed at Booth. "You are going to kiss me under the mistletoe. On the lips."

Booth's eyes widened in shock. Angela spun and speared Hodgins and Zack next. "I might kiss you guys under the mistletoe, too."

Then she was back, pinning her best friend, and the slightest hint of teasing finally crept into the lecture. "Maybe even you … in a festive, non-lesbian manner. But we are going to that party."

Every hunter knows there's safety in numbers. Booth turned to Brennan and whispered his plan. "You save me from Angela, and I'll save you. Then we'll both escape after twenty minutes and I might still have a shot at getting out of here in time to finish my Christmas shopping."

Though his breath tickled and made her shiver, she couldn't help admiring the proposal. When had he ever made more sense? Feeling her lips stretch into a surprised grin, Brennan extended her hand to shake on the arrangement. "I'm amenable to that."

"So you agree?"

She laughed and shook her head. "That's what I just said."

Evading Angela, Booth assured her, would take a great deal of concentration and more than a little luck. They managed quite well for at least 15 minutes, but there was a close call when Angela drifted near a gemologist and skated her gaze over a grouping of ferns that didn't quite conceal her best friend. Angela's eyes lit with determination and she started in that direction.

Suddenly Brennan felt herself being pulled backwards so fast she nearly lost her balance. Booth half carried, half dragged her thirty feet and ducked into an alcove.

"Booth!" she gasped. "What are you doing?!"

"Golden Rule of combat, Bones. Never leave a man behind enemy lines." His eyes twinkled at her.

"This isn't combat," she scolded, half breathless but feeling more of an urge to laugh than punch a fist through his thorax. Grabbed from behind and she laughed? That had to be a first.

Out on the floor, Angela turned a frustrated circle, having lost her quarry. With a huff, she moved on toward less agile prey.

Thereafter, as she avoided Angela's predatory lips by skulking in the corners with Booth, Brennan found herself alternately chuckling and rolling her eyes while he narrated his own wry documentary on the feeding and mating habits of various Jeffersonian fauna circling the eggnog. "See that, Bones? That there is the speckle-headed booby. See how he slowly noses the others aside with his long beak?"

"That's Dr. Gilroy. He's very distinguished and holds two PhD's. You shouldn't be calling him a booby."

Booth's low laugh was infectious. "Nope. That there is your typical Long-Beaked Speckle-Headed Booby. Rarely seen outside of museums and old people's homes."

"His nose is rather long," she conceded.

Attending a horrid Christmas party with Booth ended up being far more amusing than she would have expected. Twenty minutes stretched into nearly forty and when they finally made their way back to the lab she was almost disappointed it was over.

As she and Booth returned to the lab, she dragged Hodgins and Zack back with her because the consequences of leaving those two unsupervised might prove devastating. Angela came along, mollified to see everyone smiling at least, and Goodman brought up the rear. Zack and Hodgins moved the bomb shelter bones into Zack's Ookie room to get started so he could dash out the door and make his flight home.

Keeping company with her fourth eggnog, Angela waited for Brennan on the platform while the anthropologist filled Goodman in on Booth's latest find, and Booth was finally about to make good on his escape when...

Alarms blared, lights flashed.

"What's that?" Booth shouted, startled.

"Biological contamination," Goodman replied. He was calm but clearly had not expected the alarms.

Booth turned to flee but found himself nearly being squished in between the slamming doors.

Angela's laconic advisory reached him at the same moment. "The doors seal automatically. Don't worry about it."

"What do you mean, don't worry about it?" Booth demanded. The fact that Angela wasn't concerned should have reassured him that this was a relatively common occurrence, but it didn't.

Brennan and Goodman had both moved towards Zack's Ookie room, ready to investigate. "There's no use panicking until we know what it is," Brennan said.

"What _what_ is?"

"Uh, we might know," Hodgins offered, emerging from the Ookie room clad only in a towel and soaking wet hair.

Zack was a step behind him, equally fitted out for a trip to the sauna. "I cut into the fallout shelter bones and the biohazard alarm went off."

Goodman sounded remarkably composed when he inquired, "Were you conforming to autopsy protocol?"

Zack answered pointedly, "_One_ of us was…."

Hodgins confessed sheepishly, "The other was … drinking an eggnog."

Goodman concluded coldly, "And you didn't have your mask on." Then he groaned as the implications set in. Brennan looked annoyed. Angela was scowling at the two, and even Zack wore a sour expression.

Booth gaped at all of them, still bewildered, until he finally learned he was going to be stuck spending Christmas locked in with a bunch of squints. And it was all because Hodgins had broken the Golden Rule in the lab: follow standard autopsy protocol, which required masks and forbade food and drink.

Or rather, because Brennan had forgotten to keep the two well and truly separated for at least two hours after alcohol had been introduced to their interactions. It was simple chemistry: Hodgins + Zack + Alcohol = Disaster

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: My sketchy 'analysis' of the two bullet wounds shown in the skull of Lionel Little, plus a bit of logic, suggested to me that he was shot twice. The logic, of course, is that a single through-and-through shot might leave two holes, but then Brennan would not have been able to retrieve a bullet from inside his skull. Ergo, for a bullet to be left behind there had to be two different shots. ;)

The other aid to my analysis was the article, _Gunfire Injuries: the Pathophysiology of Gunfire Injury to Bone_, by Erin H Kimmerle and Jose Pablo Baraybar. It can be found as Chapter 7 in the book, Skeletal Trauma: Identification of Injuries Resulting from Human Rights Abuse and Armed Conflict; Kimmerle, Erin H. and Jose Pablo Braybar, etd.; CRC Press, 2008. All mistakes are mine.

~Q~

And ... if anyone reading this is also following my story Catalyst in the Partnership, I've got an update preparing to launch in the next few days.


	13. The Cat in the Box

Author's Note: The party's over, now it's time for the hangover. Being in lockdown when you'd rather be somewhere else is bound to cause tempers to fray. This episode (and this chapter) marks a turning point in Brennan's life. It's huge, actually. Maybe nobody realized it at the time, just what a big thing it was...

Oh, and while part of me hates giving away any plot hints, my own experience (while editing my own writing!) compels me to warn you. If you're the emotional sort, you might want to have a box of tissues handy when you read this.

* * *

~Q~

~The Cat in the Box~

~Q~

**Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak  
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break.**

_Macbeth, Act 4, Scene 3, line 241_

~Q~

The chance at getting any sleep ended when Angela waxed dramatic and romantic over an aborted elopement to Paris, and a girl left jilted since 1959. "Can you imagine what that must have been like for her," she sighed. "Waiting, and wondering, never knowing what happened?"

Had Angela forgotten so easily, Brennan wondered tiredly, that she was talking to the one person here who didn't have to 'imagine' it? That Brennan already knew with excruciating thoroughness what it was like to wait for hours. To worry and wait, and wait and worry. And that was just on the first day. Then more days would pass, and the worrying changed to dread. Instead of waiting to find out there was an accident and they're okay somewhere, instead the wait is for the news that they've died, because what else can it be. Why else would they vanish? But that news doesn't come and all that can be done is to wait. To wonder what happened. To go weeks and then months, and finally a year. Year after year passes, then decades, and to have no answers even after all those years had passed and made her older, but no wiser.

How easy it is to talk about imagination when it's someone else. How easy it is to imagine you can understand. How easy it is to imbue such a void with dreamy romanticism when all it really is, is a gaping black hole in the heart.

"I don't have to imagine," Brennan said flatly, wondering if that would prompt her.

It didn't. "What do you mean?"

She was too weary to muster up any hurt about Angela's lack of understanding. Some things can't be translated until they are experienced and Brennan wasn't cruel enough to wish it on anyone. "I'll tell you what I'm going to do for Christmas," she said quietly instead.

"Good. Thank you. At last you decide to take part." Judging by her at-last-she-sees-the-Christmas-lights tone, Angela must have been expecting to hear Brennan had finally been bitten by the spirit of Christmas Decorations and all things warm and fuzzy.

But that was not going to happen. Rather than let her antipathy for Christmas with all of its unpleasant memories ruin Angela's scheme to deck the halls of the Jeffersonian, she would do something productive. "I'm going to solve a murder."

She was up and out of her sleeping bag before Angela could stop her, partly because Brennan knew she was spoiling for a fight. If she stayed, she would probably snap. It was almost always better for her to be alone, especially when she had to work so hard to drive the memories back. It had always been easier to do in hot, tropical places, where the oppressive heat seared away recollections of snow and icy emptiness, where grass mats and canvas tents replaced echoing hardwood floors and glassy windows opening onto an unfilled driveway. The chittering of monkeys and birds replaced the uncertain reassurances of her teen brother just 24 hours before he vanished as well. Voluntarily.

Brennan glanced up at the ring of ficus trees surrounding the elevated loft and mused that this scenery was as tropical as she was going to get this year: a false ficus grove under florescent lights.

She started in alone, knowing everyone else was asleep and maybe that was just as well. Retrieving a bone sample and slicing it carefully under conditions of biological containment kept her busy for a good while. She worked alone for over an hour until the predicted insomnia that might be a side-effect of the anti-fungal medications worked its chemical mayhem on Booth. It had to be Booth, of course. (She would have preferred Zack's quiet and logical assistance, or even Hodgins with his infectious enthusiasm that was still mostly rational. She wouldn't have minded Goodman's calm, paternal presence.)

Instead, she got Booth. He popped up behind her while she was studying the bomb shelter body's osteological profile under the confocal microscope. She'd found traces of nickel and lead and told him so, but he didn't seem to care. They bickered over the actual date of Christmas, the 'true truth,' (which she apparently somehow spoiled with facts), and her misplaced faith in modern medicine (vs. his in helicopter pilots). He finally wandered off to stare at the lights in addled fascination and she returned to the binocular viewer and zoomed in on Haversian canals with renewed determination.

After she finished viewing several more micrograph samples of the small man's bones and recording her notes and sketches, Brennan stretched and stood to find Seeley Booth had returned, sans Santa hat.

"Aren't you cold?" he asked.

"No." And her befuddled reply must have clearly conveyed her wondering why he would ask her that.

His eyes skated over the unusually large expanse of skin her light tank top revealed, making her suddenly think of crossing her arms protectively but she resisted the puritanical urge. Oh, _that_ was why.

"You want my coat?" he offered with a smirk and a lascivious grin.

"I don't need your coat." Her mind strayed back to the cold night at the Washington Monument, then even farther back to a rainy night at the door to a pool hall when they both were intoxicated. She wondered if he was thinking of that now, the way his eyes beheld her with male interest. Maybe it was the anti-fungal drugs making him act out. Brennan shook her head and turned away, thinking it was always best not to dwell in the past.

And maybe her turning away, the subtle rejection, was what made the mood change.

"So, why do you hate Christmas," he asked suddenly, all filters dangling precariously under the tainting influence of his chemically and hormonally altered perceptions. He sounded frustrated and anger leached into his biting interrogation. "Just because you don't believe in God, you can't celebrate Christmas either?"

Brennan stiffened, her eyes narrowing. "Since the Christian God probably doesn't exist, it wouldn't be logical for me to hate a holiday that's only partly centered around His supposed mythical birth."

"It's Christmas! It's something that everybody loves. I mean, the tree, the lights, the presents."

"All of those 'traditions' are in fact based on pagan winter solstice rituals that predate Christianity. None of it has anything to do with your God."

He growled and threw his hands up in the air, finally realizing they were talking in circles. "So then why do you hate it?"

"Who says I have to love a made-up holiday that forces people to purchase cheap gifts that nobody wants out of a sense of guilt and competition. Several coastal tribes in the Pacific Northwest held potlatches every year to ostentatiously give away all of their possessions in a grand gesture of generosity but I don't see Christians embracing _that_ idea any time soon!"

"Gifts show that you care about someone," he bellowed. "Obviously you have no idea about that 'cause care doesn't come in a beaker."

If he'd intended to sting her, he'd succeeded. "If you truly want to show someone you care, then you give them something spontaneously, or something that they really need, when they need it! You don't hand over some cursory trinket as part of a social obligation and say that's proof you care."

"You give someone a Christmas gift to show them you're thinking of them," he insisted.

"What about the rest of the year," she threw at him. "You can just forget about them once Christmas passes because, hey, you gave them a pair of gloves on that _one_ day of the year. You got it covered. The rest of the time, you don't have to think of them at all." She'd lost track of how many meaningless gifts she'd received at Christmas as a foster child. Sure, people remembered the poor foster kids during Christmas; the rest of the time she was on her own, forgotten. That cheap pair of gloves was useless in June.

Booth took a step toward her, irritated at the implied attack even though he wasn't quite sure where she was coming up with this. "Just admit that you hate Christmas and that's why you're so dead set on Grinching everyone else out, huh? You've ruined my Christmas, Bones!"

All the sense of camaraderie she'd enjoyed with him that afternoon was lost in an instant. "What, are you blaming _me_ for this? _Hodgins_ was the one who flouted safety procedures in favor of eggnog."

Booth laughed and pushed the blame right back at her. "You're the one who put him to work after he'd been drinking!"

Stepping right up to him she snarled, "You're the one who brought me a body at four o'clock on the last day before Christmas!"

"I can't help it when the bodies are found," he countered, frustrated.

"You thought it was a suicide. You could have just signed off on it and gone on your merry way but no! Instead you decided to dump it on me!"

His temper slipping further, he tightened his hands up into balls of frustration as the last wisps of the peaceful truce between them evaporated. "I was just being thorough. You didn't have to obsess about it. It could have waited a few days."

"Oh really," she snarked. "Is that what was I supposed to do, just leave him there so _you_ can go have fun?"

"Yes! He's been dead fifty years. Who cares anymore?"

She whirled and stormed away from him with a muttered string of curses in two different languages, neither of which sounded like English.

"Damn it Bones!" Finally sensing he'd said the wrong thing to her again, he trotted after her and caught her arm, spinning her toward him. The bare flesh of her inner arm felt like silk under his fingertips and he released her sharply as the pleasant sensation swamped his better senses. Everything they'd begun to mend was falling apart and he had no idea why. "It's two o'clock in the morning. It's Christmas Eve Day and you're working on a fifty year old corpse that nobody cares about. Why don't you just let it go?"

Her sharp eyes pierced him with the glassy pain he was never going to get used to seeing. She lifted the two Pan-Transit tickets to Paris and waved them in his face. "Because there's someone else out there who has spent the last fifty years hating Christmas as much as I do!"

The air between them felt heavy as he drew in a breath and watched her throw the tickets on a table and leave. Somewhere a door shut emphatically, and then he was left standing alone with the skeleton of a John Doe, sealed safely away inside a containment pod. Booth sighed, running his hand through his short hair.

Someone else who hated Christmas: the mystery woman who may have been waiting for their bomb shelter man since 1959. Thoughtless gifts on Christmas and ignored the rest of the time. He should have realized it sooner, the reason she hated the holiday.

~Q~

A challenge like that requires a response and flight seemed like the most appropriate one under the circumstances. Brennan was almost flying down the stairs and managed to get to her office a few steps ahead of Angela, who wasn't backing down.

It had started with a command. "You have to find that girl and tell her what you know."

After their argument the previous night, Booth had capitulated and helped her identify the body that ended up belonging to Lionel Little, a small, lame accountant who'd loved a woman named Ivy and had been murdered at a tender 25 years old. She'd accused him of appeasement, his cooperation a gift that made _him_ feel better but ... his gift was something intangible and necessary, which made it impossible to refuse without inhibiting her own objective.

Booth, the master manipulator, had forced her to accept a Christmas gift. Now Angela was picking up his knack for forcing her into situations she would prefer to avoid, making it two against one. Was he tutoring her best friend after hours, Brennan wondered hysterically as she found her office and rushed through the door.

The story they had pieced together was that Ivy was pregnant. Being a mixed-race couple prevented them from being able to get married in the United States at that time, so Lionel had purchased a wedding ring and two one-way tickets to Paris. Once there, he had hoped to set them up on the proceeds from selling his valuable coin collection, then they would have been able to get married and live openly as a family.

Sitting on the catwalk next to Booth and Goodman while discussing the probable murder of "Careful" Lionel Little over the coin collection, she hadn't noticed Angela until the artist issued her demand: find Ivy and tell her. Brennan had startled, knowing that Angela wasn't being hypothetical about it. She was looking right at her without mercy even as Brennan sputtered out the question of how anyone would go about such a horrible task.

"Don't you see? You can give her the answer that you never got." Brennan had immediately started to protest, unnerved by the idea of being the actual messenger, but Angela was not hearing it. "I'm sorry, Sweetie, but it's true. You have a chance here."

"To say _what_." All of her own pain snarled into the scenario she envisioned: "Merry Christmas, Ivy Gillespie! Your fiance was murdered and your life was ruined, but hey! At least you get to know what happened to him."

"Don't you wish somebody had said that to you?"

The room almost seemed to spin as the idea took root. No answers for so long could only mean one thing…? Only one thing…. "Yes," she hissed, because it was awful not knowing. But no, NO she did not want anyone to tell her anything. _No,_ her own teenaged voice screamed in her memories, screamed at a social worker. _Don't tell me they're dead!_ Brennan leaped to her feet and went on the run.

"Brennan!"

Angela chased her into her office, cornering her there. The door closed behind her, and she leaned against it as if to prevent escape.

"I can't do that!" Brennan gasped out, on the verge of rage or grief, spinning back and forth between the two. "I can't _do_ that to her! You don't understand."

"I know that I don't. Only you do. Don't you see why that means _you're_ the only one who can tell Ivy what happened? You're the only one who does understand."

"No!" A crushing sob broke on the word. "No, I can't kill her hope." Because that is exactly what she would be doing.

Someone goes missing and knowing why, knowing what happened, disappears into a sealed box. It sits there like the box with Schrodinger's Cat, all possibilities open. They are dead, they are alive: both are true as long as the box stays closed. There's still hope as long as the box stays closed, but Angela was asking her to rip open the box in front of Ivy, to reveal that the demise of her cat had happened fifty years ago. Lionel was dead.

Compassion pulled Angela away from the door and toward Brennan who had dropped onto her chair, her face buried in her hands while she fought back waves of tears and a choking sensation. "That's what is upsetting you? The idea of taking hope away from Ivy?"

"If you find out they're dead, there's no way they're coming back." _They're not coming back._ As anguish gripped her throat and made her gasp for breath, her vision rippled and her temples throbbed. They're never coming back.

She could not do this to another person, make them ache like this. But she'd been doing it, the last grasping tendrils of reason asserted. She'd been ripping open boxes with Booth. Cleo's box and Maggie's box and Eve Warren. Box after box they ripped open together, showing the death inside. Brennan shuddered.

"It means letting go all the way." Angela pulled Brennan into an embrace. "Sweetie, maybe that's a good thing."

She gasped again, torn by the pain."How could that possibly be good?" This was what she was doing all along, from the moment Booth took her to meet Cleo Eller's parents.

Hope was a wispy thing, so fragile, so easily lost between desperately grasping fingers. Even as she tightened her grip on it, the last shreds tore loose, falling away in tatters just like the increasingly misty memories of her parents. The first tear escaped out of her left eye and tickled on the edge of her lashes before it fell, reminding her that sometimes feelings were complicated. She could feel what her message did to them and what it would do to Ivy. She felt what it was doing to her as hope died, how it seemed she was both crushed and uncontained as the truth settled in and made itself comfortable.

"Well, because maybe there are other feelings Ivy can let go of at the same time. I mean, she was pregnant and he disappeared. What if she's been angry with him all these years, thinking he didn't love her and just walked away?"

Under the weight of her own emerging truth, the very large container that had held all her anger and fury over being left behind burst open. _Russ_. Brennan squeezed her eyes shut, overwhelmed and floundering in a churning wave of her own unfettered chaos. _Russ left me and I never forgave him_.

Had Ivy spent the last 50 years hating Lionel the way she hated Russ? Lionel never abandoned Ivy, not the way Russ had left her, and she knew Ivy should know that. Lionel would want her to know what he'd tried to do for her. She could open the box and show Lionel was dead, but he hadn't left her. He'd had other dreams for Ivy, plans that never came to pass.

"Instead of being angry," Angela was saying softly, "She can just be sad."

Brennan finally let go and let herself be swept up in the flood. What if someone did that for her? What if she learned Russ hadn't left her intentionally, that it was beyond his control? What if someday she found out that her parents were dead? What happens when hope has gone…? She can stop being angry, she can stop waiting.

She can just be sad.

Sobs shook her as Angela anchored her and let her cry.

~Q~

Brennan stood beside Lionel Little's body, her hand pressed through the glove and clasping his phalanges as she watched Ivy Gillespie make her proud exit. Though she hadn't said anything, hadn't really known what to say, somehow Brennan knew Ivy was relieved to be feeling sad.

"She knows you didn't leave her," Brennan whispered to Lionel. "She's not angry with you anymore."

Of course he couldn't hear her, of course her clasping of his dry and brittle metacarpals went unnoticed. Brennan withdrew her gloved hand, feeling self-conscious despite the fact that there was no one to witness her anthropomorphizing of a skeleton.

The elderly woman had cried and pressed those long-ago love letters to her breast. "You've given me back my life."

How could that be possible, she wondered. Ivy's life was drawing to its close, all of her youthful dreams having been crushed by racism, prejudice and a cruel man's greed. She'd spent her life angry, abandoned, struggling. Now at the end she learned, it might not have been this way if circumstances had been kinder. Her life might have been wonderful, if only...

Brennan's life might have been different, too. If only. Booth would say everything happens for a reason, but that implied fate and Temperance Brennan did not believe in fate.

He'd invited her to join him at his friend Sid's restaurant, the Chinese place. The afterthought of inviting her after everyone else had run off to be with loved ones, offered as he himself paused at the door but didn't tarry, made her ache. Her pride pushed her to stay away, but he might want to know she'd talked to Ivy. Brennan found him at the bar and after she told him, he smirked, "who's the Secret Santa now?" She'd given Ivy two gifts, one intangible (knowledge) and one invaluable (the letters Lionel had cherished).

And a coin worth $100,000.

Parker arrived and waved at her with a four year old's shyness as Booth carried him away. She was alone again, so she decided to go home to the Jeffersonian.

As evening fell she walked through the lab and when she stepped into her office, her home, she made a decision.

It was time to open the box. She could do it, Booth had taught her how.

~Q~

"Wait here."

Making her way down the left side of the lab, Angela paused and frowned when she saw that the lights in Brennan's office were off. Maybe she was wrong and Brennan had gone to her apartment after all. The sound of wrinkling paper drifted to her from off to her right, however. Puzzled, she pivoted and headed towards her own office.

The scene that met her eyes was one she would never forget. Temperance Brennan knelt in the midst of a small sea of Christmas wrapping paper and opened boxes, tears streaming down her cheeks and shoulders hunched as she stared at her long-buried treasure. She had turned on the holographic projector, playing the Christmas Tree program, and under the illusory tree she laid to rest the ghosts of her Christmas Past.

Knowing what this was, Angela didn't even need to ask. Still, the sympathetic little gasp couldn't be held back. "Oh, Sweetie…."

"They're not coming back," was all she said, sounding every bit as hollow as she felt.

Dropping to her knees and drawing her friend into another hug, Angela chided gently, "Why didn't you call me?"

Brennan shrugged, gaze averted. "You said Christmas is one of the only times you get to have with your dad."

"I'm sorry."

"It's fine, Angela." Brennan pulled loose and resumed collecting the discarded wrapping paper. "There's nothing anyone can do about it."

She helped Brennan carefully replace the covers on the opened boxes and shook her head. "No, I mean I'm sorry for running off and leaving you alone tonight. I want you to come with me."

"What about your dad?"

"He wants you to come with us."

She looked keenly uncomfortable. "No, Angela. I couldn't. You should be with your family."

"So should you," Angela told her softly. "You _are_ my family. You're like the sister I always wanted. Dad understands."

Brennan shook her head. "He doesn't even know me."

"Baby girl, there's where you couldn't be more wrong."

The gravelly voice startled them both. Angela smiled and nodded, but Brennan was only more confused.

Billy Gibbons removed his signature black glasses to look at his daughter's friend, to let her see just how serious he could be. His pale blue eyes pierced her deeply, but not unkindly. "I know everything I need to know. My dear sweet Angela thinks the world of you, and that makes you family in my book."

The glasses went back on and he fell silent, but his subtle endorsement of Angela's plan could hardly be ignored. Nothing about Billy Gibbons could be ignored.

"You don't have to be alone," Angela said gently.

So Brennan went with her, accepting one more intangible gift that Christmas in 2005.

~Q~

* * *

Author's note: This episode always makes me cry, no matter how many times I watch it. It's the first time Brennan truly connects with the pain of a living victim, more than with the dead one. It also shows us the moment Brennan truly begins to grieve the loss of her parents. She's finally giving up hope that they'll return. It's painful, but also liberating.

The winds of change are blowing through the Jeffersonian. We'll see the effects starting with the next chapter.


	14. The Stones on the Plank

Author's Note: This is only the second story I've attempted to write on the fly. Working up the courage to start publishing something before I had finished it the first time came as the result of an argument that spawned Doomed to Repeat (it was spirited and all in good fun). This story resulted from a dare (mine, to another writer), and the prompt for this was her retaliation. I brought it on myself by daring her first, of course. :D

Half the terror of a dare is that you don't know what to expect and maybe you don't even have a plan. You're just doing it because, well, you were dared.

My point ... is that this story has a point. And better still, an end point. ;)

Even though I started off exploring unknown territory by creating the story as I go, I've a map and we're making progress. It doesn't seem like it yet, but we're heading to the top of the first big hill and you're going to see the lay of the land. You'll see where the rest of the journey is going to take us in a few more chapters. Right here, the incline is growing steep but it's definitely going somewhere.

(I won't say 'trust me' because we all know those two words always seem to end in disaster. Not unlike the way 'I dare you' always seems to result in a misadventure you'll tell your grand-kids about.)

* * *

~Q~

~The Stones on the Plank~

~Q~

**"Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,  
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow...  
And with some sweet oblivious antidote  
Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff  
Which weighs upon the heart?**

_Macbeth, Act V, Scene 3_

~Q~

**February 2006**

"It's like they recreated their own country here, right down to being terrified of the police." The hand-painted business signs and the scent of fried _pupusas_ filled with _queso con loroco_ plopped Brennan right into the streets of San Salvador. For a second she closed her eyes and inhaled the familiar, mouth-watering aroma, heard the softly blurred tones of Salvadoran Spanish surrounding her. For a second she was there.

Booth shrugged. "Yeah, a lot of these people are undocumented. They get nervous around law enforcement."

Opening her eyes again, she was surrounded by a milling crowd of people, mostly small of stature with dark, distrustful eyes. They shifted and murmured as the police swarmed their barrio. Brennan stood still and panned her gaze over the people she felt like she knew while Booth moved off to join the uniformed officers. Yes, many of these frightened people probably were undocumented but even those with legitimate papers were afraid. They all were afraid. She sighed, knowing their fears had nothing to do with documents.

When the police pointed out a mostly skeletonized body in the back of a gang member's car trunk, she shifted her focus and leaned in to touch the skull gently. Her assessment came fast: female, Hispanic, young adult, dental hypoplasia (malnutrition during her youth). She was only very recently unearthed from the earth itself. There hadn't been a casket and the dark soil clinging to the bones was still moist and smelled of rich humus. The bones were silent, she wasn't sure why. Something about the silence bothered her so much that she swept her gloved fingers over the dome of the cranium just to be sure she wasn't missing anything. Her fingers tripped over a small depression fracture and a little squawk sounded at last, an aural flinch as she touched the injured spot.

Brennan looked into the eyes (they would be dark brown, rich like humus) and wondered where her outrage had gone.

Booth asked the driver where the woman had been buried. The young Hispanic male stoically ignored everyone around him. Thinking he knew what she hoped to learn, Brennan leaned in to translate. "He asked, where was she buried." Undercurrents swirled around them both, the bones' silent trust, the young man's edgy silence, the murmurs of the crowd and the ever nagging question of _why_. She always wondered why. So Brennan added her own question, sensing the answer had nothing to do with gang activity. "And why did you dig her up?"

No answer. Booth rolled his eyes. "Great. Now he's ignoring us in two languages."

Questions were piling up. She asked the uniformed officer where there was a cemetery. He replied Holy Rood was nearest, but it was ten miles away. The young woman had not been in a coffin, however, that much was obvious to her. Brennan turned to the crowd of onlookers, knowing it was futile but she would ask anyway. Perhaps they knew of a closer one, a more secret location for those who were undocumented.

"Excuse me. Can you help us? We need to know if there's a cemetery nearby." Though speaking Spanish now, she deliberately asked the same question that she'd just asked the uniformed officer, knowing that many in the crowd would speak English well enough to know what was going on. She only wanted to know who the woman in the car was, where she'd come from. If one of them would volunteer the location of a possible hidden cemetery, it might lead to the girl's name. Opening a door, getting one of them to talk, that was the best she could hope for.

The moment she asked, most of them scattered like a startled flock of birds.

Booth leaned in to tease, "Maybe your Spanish is a little rusty."

Frustrated, she turned to glare at him. "They come from a place where getting involved gets you killed."

He had no idea. None.

Before she could go any further, claps startled her. She knew that sound, had ducked it before. Booth reacted at the same instant, both of them pivoting and throwing themselves down and behind the stopped car while a black luxury sedan drove past and pelted everything with wildly straying bullets. The young man who'd been pulled over dashed down the street, shackled fists pumping as he propelled himself to escape.

A moment later when the sedan rushed away, Booth hot-footed after him.

Brennan got up slowly, noticing that everyone had fled the streets, not that she could blame them. Maybe now he would see: in El Salvador, getting involved with the police gets people killed.

~Q~

Following the dirt trail from the shovel and the girl's body (Hodgins would scowl at the use of a nebulous term like 'dirt') led them to a garden patch where loroco was grown, a second unearthed grave, and finally to the house of a senator where a second body had been deposited carefully by a pond. The young man connecting the two bodies was named as Jose Vargas, a part-time landscaper with a wife and son. He wasn't a member of any gang they were assured, by no less an authority than that senator's own son.

Jose's apartment appeared unoccupied when the landlord let them in. No one had answered their knock and the warrant served as a key. Booth entered first and announced he was FBI. "Make your presence known."

Brennan followed him in, noting signs of poverty and pride in the clean yet shabby apartment. She saw a photo of the young man standing beside a woman who held a baby. "Look, he has a family. A baby." She offered the proof to Booth, who spared it half a glance.

"Is anybody here? You don't have to be afraid." She paused and then repeated the reassurance in Spanish.

"Of course they're going to be afraid, Bones. I have a gun." He gestured with his weapon, out and ready. He didn't trust house entries because cops often met their end on enemy territory. He found a baby bottle sitting nearby, still warm, and speculated that they'd only just left.

It wasn't just his gun that had them scared, it was _him_. It was both of them, entering, searching, a gun in hand and smelling of government authority. If the bottle was warm... Brennan glanced around, looking for the the blank space because she knew what a Salvadoran woman would do under these circumstances. "They're still here."

"How do you know?" Booth asked.

"They're prepared for this kind of thing." It was the only way to survive. You hide and you hope they don't figure out where. They know you're hiding. They turn your house inside out. There's noise and crashing, taunting, terror. "Hiding from death squads, people learn to build false walls."

She scanned fast, knowing the signs. As soon as she saw what she was looking for her steps sped towards it.

"The closet?" She was already halfway inside when Booth called out impatiently and pulled her back. "Okay, Bones, let's just pretend for a second that _I'm_ the cop. Okay?"

He went into the large, mostly empty closet and started knocking against the walls, listening for the hollowness of empty space behind. Brennan drew a breath, imagining the woman inside holding her breath and shrinking backwards. Booth's knocks moved over the wall steadily, creeping forward.

She will be panting inside, trying not to scream as the tension builds. Her heart will be pounding and she'll feel both faint and frantic for action as all the adrenaline her body can make empties into her system. She's holding still and she can't stand it. She wants to run. There's nowhere to run.

Booth found the hollow spot, turned to glance at Brennan's pale face. Her heart is pounding, too, when he turns and jerks the almost hidden latch. The wall falls forward and inside the terrified cry sounds like it came from an injured animal.

She is sitting at the back, clutching her infant to her and rocking back and forth. She lifts wide, pleading eyes to Booth and flicks them to Brennan, because she's a woman and women don't go out with the death squads. And that's the only hope she has.

The pleading litany went on for several minutes while Brennan reached out a hand and guided her to sit on her carefully made bed. "Yo no se nada. Por favor! Yo no se nada!"

Booth paced, examined the rest of the apartment.

Brennan spoke softly, in Spanish. "We only want to know where Jose is. He's fine if he hasn't done anything."

She sobbed, "Yo no se nada!"

Booth impatiently asked, "What did you say?"

"That we just want to talk to Jose. That they'll all be safe. They've nothing to worry about." The terrified woman needed to be reassured that they weren't a death squad. That was the only way they would get her to talk.

Evidently he was unhappy with her technique. He turned and spat out a much harsher demand. "Do you want to be _deported_? Do you want to see your baby again? Because if he was born here, he doesn't have to go back to El Salvador with you. _We can keep him_!"

Brennan gasped. "Booth! Stop! She's frightened enough!"

"Bones, we have a double murder on our hands."

"But _she_ didn't do it!"

"Just tell her what I said. Okay? Tell her we're calling immigration. Tell her we'll get to Jose."

On the bed behind him, the woman cringed. 'Immigration' was a fearful word in any language. She watched the argument heating up, knowing it was over her. The man was angry, demanding, but at least he'd put away his gun. The woman was softer, kinder, but growing angry now. Whatever he was telling her was making her argue with him fiercely.

"No! She's lived with terror and intimidation her whole life. I'm not going to add to it." She felt the woman's fear invading her, knew full well the terror of a man threatening a god-awful fate. Her own ancient fears swirled in and her heart thudded painfully under her sternum. Fear was often contagious, and sometimes it was latent, just waiting for a trigger.

"You know what? You're acting like I'm going to hurt her or something!"

Brennan swallowed at his accusation. Didn't he know he was already hurting her? He was terrifying to look at. This harshly lined, furious face was the face she'd hit eighteen months ago when he'd grabbed her arm and dragged her out of an interrogation room. _"Let go of me!" She twisted loose. "I will if you'd just—" She whirled and struck out in blind fury, in remembered fear. Her fist connected with his cheek in a stunning blow as she accused him of being a bully._

His angry eyes bored into hers, showing they were clearly on opposite sides now. "I'm just trying to get a little information."

Fear and grief spilled into her voice, glowed in her eyes. "I'm asking you, as a favor, not to make me do this. To scare her."

Then she was begging him. "_Please_."

Booth watched her fall apart on him and there was nothing he could do but give in.

~Q~

Jose, beaten and broken, avoided their eyes. Brennan felt his fear, tried to reach him and get him to open up when she saw the truth of the situation. It was his own father and sister he'd been trying to bury in the most proper location he could manage. Was that why the bones were silent? Or was it because the fear drowned out all the other noises. The fear plopped around them like hurled stones, pelting everyone connected to Little Salvador.

During the Salem witch trials, one of the accused witches (Giles Corey, a man) was subjected to _Peine forte et dure_ (punishment strong and hard) via a method called pressing. It was the legal remedy for an accused person refusing to enter a plea when charged with a crime. Corey refused to enter a plea when he was accused of sorcery, thereby thwarting efforts to try him for witchcraft. So, the government reasoned, he must have the words forced out of him.

Pressing is accomplished by stripping an accused person naked, covering them with planks, and then placing heavy stones upon them. The weight of the stones compresses the rib cage, hampering the ability of the diaphragm and lungs to expand. All the air is pressed out and eventually, given enough weight, the pressed person is unable to draw in a breath. Suffocation ensues. (Legend has it that Giles Corey bravely endured the accumulation of stones, and his final words were, "more weight," presumably a plea for the mercy of a rapid death.)

Fear is a weight. Stone by stone, the fears pile on and bury whole communities in suffocating paralysis.

The last stone dropped when Ortiz tried to intimidate her. Rosa's terrified face flashed in her mind (one stone), and Jose's edgy, stoic fear that kept him quiet (two stones). The people on the street with drawn, worried faces, all of them retreating when the cops turned their way (twenty stones). Villagers huddled in hidden rooms (two hundred stones). Booth's aggression. Soldiers with guns, cops who threatened and kidnapped. Men who used the threats and violence to make a woman do what they wanted. A contorted face that shoved her cruelly into a car trunk.

The fear clenched and squeezed them all until they couldn't speak for lack of breath. She couldn't breathe and she was so damn sick of it.

Booth was standing in the hallway.

Stepping in front of Ortiz, her low challenge was how she found a way to breathe. "How do you handle someone who isn't afraid of you...?"

~Q~

Her closest friend stormed into her office wearing an appalled grimace. "You beat up a gang leader?"

Brennan turned away from her computer, surprised by the outburst from the ordinarily peaceful forensic artist. She was still more surprised that Angela even knew. Why would he say anything to her? "Booth told you that?"

Angela was incredulous. She hadn't quite believed it until now. "You did! You got into a fight with a gangbanger."

Confused by Angela's shock and disbelief, she asked, "You're mad at me?"

"The guy's a _killer_, Brennan."

She scoffed. "Angela, relax. We were in the FBI building." The presence of dozens of armed agents had contributed to her willingness to confront and provoke Ortiz, otherwise, she might have thought better of it. But she said none of this out loud, sensing it would set Angela further on edge.

"Look, I know you're all about self-reliance, and fighting your own battles, and standing up for yourself. But now, as your friend, and knowing how much you hate psychology here … you need therapy."

Seeing how upset Angela was, Brennan looked a bit contrite. "I'm sorry I upset you. It's just that, I've dealt with him before."

"With who?" Angela took a seat, sweeping her black hair back with a graceful hand. Her lovely, almond-shaped eyes were elongated with suspicion.

Brennan shrugged. Who hadn't she had to deal with. "People who get what they want through fear. Gangbangers, members of death squads…." Soldiers, cops, judges, foster fathers.

"I know it's psychology again, but you said, '_him_.' Like, one guy."

Brennan answered slowly. "I didn't mean Ortiz, specifically. I meant … people like him." She looked down, deciding she should explain. "On my trip to El Salvador last year…."

Angela didn't need reminding. "Yeah, I remember. I tried to get you to go to Italy with me."

Gathering her thoughts, she started out slowly. "I was in a tent set up by one of the grave sites. I was working with the remains of a young girl, maybe 13. She'd been shot in the head and dumped into a well. This cop shows up; um, he might have been a soldier. It's … not easy to tell." Her voice started to shake just a little. "I thought he was there to guard me, but he told me to stop. When I refused, he called in two others."

She hesitated, seeing Angela tensely waiting for more. For the worst. "They put a bag over my head and tossed me into a cell with a dirt floor and no windows."

"For how long?" Angela asked softly, afraid to react the way she so desperately wanted to lest it send Brennan scurrying back into silence.

"Later I found out it was three days. But, I thought it was a week, maybe more." Darkness robbed the body of diurnal rhythms. Day and night didn't exist. Time stretched into impossible eternities. The only way to mark the passage of time had been the intermittent visits, and the company he provided was worse than being alone in the dark. "He came in every day and made me believe that I was going to die. He said that he'd shoot me and toss me into a well, and that no one would ever know who I was or what became of me."

Fear. He brought with him thick, suffocating terror in the guise of promises. He would shoot her ... maybe here. Maybe there. Maybe he would do other things first. He would tease with sickly threatening words and occasional touches that would crawl over her consciousness and when she started to desire his promised oblivion at the bottom of a well if only it would bring an end to the terror, she knew he was winning.

"I promised myself, if I ever had the chance, I'd get even." A tear was hanging from the corner of one eye, but she laughed a little. "That doesn't mean I need therapy."

Silence was a weight. The pressure of finding words pressed down on Angela so relentlessly that the interruption felt like a blessing.

Hodgins stopped at the door to announce Maria Duarte's head was struck by something made of Kumaru. Sensing the tension between the two friends, he paused and inquired "Am I interrupting a female moment?"

Brennan denied it. Not female, not feminine. Terror was always man-made.

Angela waited him out, and the moment he left she turned them back to a discussion was not over as far as she was concerned. Still shocked by what she'd just heard, she could barely find the words to express the horror. 'I'm sorry' just sounded so lame and 'I'm glad he didn't actually kill you and throw you down a well' just made her stomach churn. She gagged on nausea and could only hoarsely beg, "Why didn't you tell me?!"

"I didn't want to talk about it. I still don't."

Something had happened, she'd known from the moment Brennan came back. A sick knowing twisted in her head as Angela tried not to imagine what Brennan had endured, what atrocities she might not be willing to admit to.

"Does Booth know?"

"No."

"You should tell him."

"No!" It came out cracking and clear. Then she softened her tone into a semi-shrug. "It doesn't matter."

Tears sprang to her eyes when Brennan repeated her too frequent mantra. People inflicted devastating pain and horror on her and all she ever came back with was, 'it doesn't matter.' It mattered to Angela. Booth was waiting for an answer because it mattered to him. "But he's asking me about it. What am I supposed to tell him?"

Brennan shrugged fully this time. And sat quietly, her eyes distant.

Angela waited several seconds. "Brennan?"

"I was just ... remembering." She looked away, wondering if Booth would stop letting her go with him. Wondering if she should stop wanting to go with him.

"Remembering what?" She sensed Brennan wasn't thinking about days in the dark; something else was bothering her.

Looking back at Angela, she sighed. "That you can't trust cops."

That was not what she'd expected to hear. Brennan didn't want Booth to know about her captivity, then said she couldn't trust cops. Angela felt her mouth open a little, words stalling somewhere between disbelief and fear.

"Are you ... are you talking about Booth?"

"What? No!" Brennan shook her head and realized she wasn't making sense. "I don't know. Just ... he made me threaten a woman. He wanted me to translate threats. In El Salvador, in Guatemala, places like that, men with badges and guns, you can't trust them."

"But you trust Booth. Right?"

Recalling what she'd yelled at him eighteen months ago, Brennan pressed her face into her hands. He'd told her to stop, had grabbed her by the arm, dragged her away from the truth. Flashes of other incidents with 'cops,' and 'soldiers' who stormed into an excavation and demanded she stop at gunpoint had spiked in her memories when he took her so forcefully away. _"You are a bully! You use your badge and your gun to intimidate people!"_ Just like they always did, abusing their government-issued authority.

What did she think now? Did she trust him?

_"You're a good man." His eyes had opened wide. "How do you know?"_

"I want to," she realized slowly, saying it out loud. "But he wanted me to threaten her. She was so scared. Where she comes from, the cops are as bad as the criminals and he was yelling at her, telling me to tell her he'd take her baby away. I couldn't do that to her. She was already terrified because he's a cop."

Angela leaned forward and pointed out an obvious truth. "I understand what you're saying, but Brennan ... that's not why you beat up a gang-banger. Is it."

"I beat him up because I could," she answered bluntly.

Slowly, she was figuring it out. "Because Booth is a cop?"

"Yeah," she said softly, breathing the word out. Because he was standing in the hallway. When Booth was near, she could breathe.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Say it with Angela: "Now we're getting somewhere..."

We're not finished yet. Next chapter will show you the full source and impact of Brennan's impulsive behavior. You know what happens, but do you know why...?


	15. Saving the Scientist

Author's Note: Surprise! A bonus update this weekend because we left Angela wondering what to tell Booth.

You see, he called her. Booth called Angela specifically to tell her about Brennan's take-down of Ortiz. Booth is a very intelligent man with strong instincts. He knows there is something going on with Brennan (or else he wouldn't have called Angela), and he knows there will be some heavy consequences. Furthermore, he is a master at using various psychological tricks to get information from people, even Brennan. All of these facts explain why I'm quite sure that I'm not too far off with the contents of this chapter.

* * *

~Q~

~Saving the Scientist~

~Q~

**"Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,  
Such a dependency of thing on thing,  
As e'er I heard in madness."**

_Measure for Measure, Act V, Scene 1_

~Q~

It had been a long day, filled with interviews, paperwork, calls, meetings. He couldn't wait to get out of here and head home for some beer and a hockey game on TV. Booth straightened the stack of files on his desk that he'd get to in the morning, and reached for his jacket.

So fixated was he on getting home, the phone call had taken him by surprise. The source of the call was even more surprising. Angela Montenegro had never found any reason to call Booth directly—typically any information she had to relay to him came through Brennan or else she told him in person when he went to the Jeffersonian. Tonight, however, Angela was calling him directly and he knew it must have something to do with Brennan, with what had happened today.

He'd called Angela earlier to tell her about the altercation, suspecting it was, well … he didn't know what. He'd just felt instinctively that Angela needed to know. Maybe he'd hoped that Angela could explain it because even though he'd only been working with her for a few months, he knew Brennan's behavior today had been far out of the ordinary. Typically Brennan only reacted after someone had crossed her boundaries, but this time she'd instigated it.

Barely wasting a moment for social pleasantries, Angela had launched right in. "Have you talked to Brennan? About today?"

Booth found himself sitting up a little straighter. "No, I— She left."

"You need to talk to her, Booth."

He'd called Angela only a few minutes after it had happened, once Ortiz had been escorted out of the Hoover building and deposited in his own neighborhood (miles away from the Jeffersonian, just to be safe). After hearing about the altercation, Angela had held her tongue for a full minute before finally blowing out a breath and muttering, "Sometimes I feel like I'm in over my head with her."

Booth had laughed without mirth. "You and me, both."

"I don't know what to tell you," Angela had continued. "Only ... you said he was from El Salvador?"

"Yeah."

Another pause while she considered such an unlikely coincidence. "Let me talk to her. I'll call you later." And then she'd hung up.

Now Angela was calling him back; that must mean she'd learned something. He asked her, "Did she tell you about it?"

"I can't tell you. I mean, she'd kill me if she even knew I was calling you. But you need to talk to her. There's just ... so much."

Booth felt the weight of Angela's words settling heavily over him. "Like what?"

"Things like, what made her start a fight with that guy. Whether she trusts you or not. You need to hear it and she needs … therapy."

He almost laughed at Angela's assessment of his partner's mental health, but the remark about Brennan not trusting him plunged straight to his gut. They'd argued about how to question Jose Vargas/Duarte's wife. Swallowing nausea, he remembered what Angela had said earlier about being in over her head with Brennan. He was right there with her, standing on the bottom of the pool with at least a foot of Brennanite mystery sloshing overhead.

He didn't quite understand Angela's faith in his ability to extract personal information from the notoriously private scientist, however. "She never tells me anything. What makes you think she'll tell me this, whatever it is?"

"You have a way with her. I don't know, you push her buttons. Do what you do to get her to open up."

~Q~

After hours at the Jeffersonian imbued the silvery steel lab with a paradoxical romance. During the day, lights and voices bounced off harsh metal surfaces in festive exuberance, zinging every which way. It was spirited, rather like an indoor pool filled with cavorting children: a perfect backdrop for the often equally exuberant reactions of Hodgins discovering a new kind of mold or Zack attempting yet another haphazard experiment. As darkness fell and the staff drifted home, peace settled in until all that remained was a hushed silence and softly glowing floor lights. The few times he'd come here after hours, Booth had found that he liked it better at night. He suspected that his partner did too, since she spent so much time here after everyone else went home.

He found Bones still in her office, standing next to the shelves behind her desk and gazing pensively at a skull set at eye level. It might be the one she'd brought back from Guatemala, the one she'd had at the airport. She was so lost in thought that she didn't hear him. Pausing at her door, he allowed himself a moment to observe and appreciate the scientist who had become so much more than a 'contracted expert' in the last year. He wasn't quite sure what they were to each other; more than partners, something close but not quite friends. He enjoyed being with her even though she baffled him and drove him straight out of his tree more often than not.

No one could surprise him so effortlessly as she so often did and that in itself was part of the attraction. For a jaded man who spent his life reading people like newspapers, Brennan was a tightly rolled ancient Chinese scroll. Just when he thought he might finally be figuring her out, she provided the proof that he was only deluding himself. He would never figure her out completely: he would never know what she would do next, what bizarre misquote of slang she would toss out, or what abrupt turn her fertile mind would make that would close his investigation like a mousetrap springing shut on its unsuspecting prey.

Case in point: what she had done today had certainly shocked him. And it scared the crap out of him as the ramifications of it had settled in. God knew, there was going to be some hell to pay.

He spoke quietly, hoping not to startle her. "Hey, Bones."

Shaken loose from whatever thoughts had held her, Brennan glanced at him and faintly smiled a welcome.

Booth hesitated a moment, then decided he would just get right to the point. Brennan, he knew, didn't have much use for beating around the bush—she was always one to leap right into the middle of every thorny question that needed asking. "So, what happened today?"

The smile fell from her lips, just that fast. Warily, Brennan replied with a typically literal rendition of the day's events. She started with the morning and cataloged an exhausting list of tasks that finally ended with her having just finished up an authentication for the Native American Museum.

Shutting the door behind him for privacy, he stepped fully into her office, his eyes direct. "You left out the interesting part."

"What part?" Brennan held his gaze steady with nary a flinch nor a flicker.

He almost believed she didn't know what he was talking about. Almost, except for the part where she was a genius and very little escaped her. "The part where you got into a fight with Ortiz."

"Oh, that." She shrugged.

"So," he repeated firmly, "what happened?"

"I beat him up."

Booth blew out an irritated breath. "Yeah, Bones, I saw that. What I'm asking is, _why_."

Her eyes reminded him of a frozen lake, silvery grey under leaded skies. "He put his hands on me."

Ordinarily, that would be enough of an explanation. From one personal experience and having observed plenty of corroborating incidents afterwards, Booth knew that any reckless soul making the mistake of grabbing her arm was guaranteed to net a blow from her formidable fist. Brennan did not allow herself to be grabbed or manhandled—invariably, her reaction was a swift and painful retribution. However, that was not the reason this time. He'd watched her place herself in Ortiz's path.

"You provoked him."

She didn't deny it. "He pissed me off."

"What did he do that made you that angry?"

Brennan turned, walked a few steps further away. Ever the keen observer, Booth noticed she had put her desk between herself and him. He watched her hands come up to her arms, a defensive posture, but anger had tightened her back and jaw.

"People like him, they think they can just do whatever they want. They use power to intimidate others. I hate that."

He shook his head, unconvinced. "I've never seen you start a fight like that before."

She bristled. "You don't know me that well, Booth."

"Maybe I want to know you that well," he countered smoothly. He captured her eyes and let his bore into hers, searching for clues. He was reminded anew just how stunning her changeable eyes were. Silvery blue, misty green, liquid mercury, flashing like sunlit glass one moment and lightening the next. She was breathtaking, this beautiful woman, and he allowed himself to openly appraise that fact. Knowing his gaze was turning steamy, he used the mounting tension to his advantage.

Brennan crinkled her brow. He didn't flirt with her that openly very often. She wasn't sure this was flirting, despite what the words seemed to mean. The usual teasing light in his eyes that indicated flirtation was missing this time. Instead, it was intensity that she saw, determination. Desire. Confusion stalled her tongue while she tried to interpret the expression on his face.

He held her gaze, and she felt he was stripping away every barrier she tried to hide behind. When Seeley Booth tuned the full spectrum of his attention on her there no escaping the silent interrogation. She shivered, dropped her eyes from his in sudden fear of what he would see in her.

"Temperance." His voice stroked her skin like velvet, warm and sinful. "I want to know you."

The words poured over her like a wave of molten chocolate. She inhaled sharply, stunned that such a simple statement could shake her so thoroughly. She felt raw, exposed. "Booth…."

"Let me in," he persisted in a seductive whisper. He watched her eyes widen, her lips parting breathlessly. Ten feet stretched between them, yet he felt her as if she were beside him. This wasn't what he'd intended, this almost painful awareness that wrapped itself around them. It was just as well she was that far away. He knew if she was any closer he would be kissing her. Plunging his hands into her soft chestnut hair and pressing her slender body back against the nearest wall. There was nothing but imagined space between them.

Falling prey to a force she didn't understand, Brennan felt her heart race and an unfamiliar fluttering in her belly. She'd never felt this way before, like he was touching her even when he was across the room. Like she couldn't breathe. Trembling, she tried to gather up her scattered wits and mount a defense against this unexpected assault. "What are you doing," she wondered faintly.

He gave her a slow, devastating smile. "Seducing you."

Caught off guard by the overly confident confession, she closed her eyes and broke the spell. Awareness of what had happened, of how successful he'd been with less than a dozen words, doused her with humiliation. It was just like that night at the pool hall, somehow he said things that made her lose her mind. A surge of self-recrimination flushed her cheeks and burned away the clots of desire that had clogged up her thinking. She was furious with herself for letting him have that effect on her. Now thoroughly off balance, she ground out, "What do you want?"

She'd reverted to anger. Booth shuddered a little, relieved to escape the cloying sexual tension and his own near loss of control. Thinking about kissing her was not supposed to happen, and he certainly hadn't expected her to react the way that she had. He spoke, she fell and pulled him in, and their mutual attraction was proved a force that required their mutual vigilance to resist. How they would navigate such a treacherous course without falling into each other was something he would have to sort out later.

For now he would stay safely away from her, over here, and let her anger buffer them both. Anger was by far a safer emotion to feel with her, and anger was readily available at any rate. It was why he'd come here, after all. "I want to know what the hell you were thinking today. Why you provoked Ortiz. Why you looked so damn self-satisfied when you had him on the ground. I want to know what possessed you to act so recklessly."

Hearing the anger in his voice, so abrupt after the silken seductiveness of only moments before, she paused, disoriented again. "It wasn't reckless," she contradicted. She was in the Hoover Building, surrounded by armed FBI Agents, and backed by Booth. It wasn't reckless.

"The hell it wasn't!" he roared. "This isn't over, you know. He's not going to just slink off with his tail between his legs, not a man like Ortiz. He's going to have something to prove."

His harsh tone made her flinch and doubt entered her face for the first time. Doubt, but not regret. Not remorse. "So what?"

"So, what you do affects me. I'm your partner." Frustrated and more frightened for her than he was willing to admit, he ran a hand over his face. There would be repercussions, and it would be his responsibility to deal with them. He'd already alerted the gang units in the FBI and the local PDs to keep their ears to the ground.

"It had nothing to do with you." In mere seconds, with just a few words, Booth had crashed through every defense and left her wide open. She couldn't fathom how he'd done it so quickly, so easily. Did he realize how exposed she was? If so, she would be at his mercy and the suspicion that he might have done it with express purpose thundered through her thoughts and stretched her as taut as piano wire.

"No? What does it have to do with, then? Tell me what was going through your mind when you decided to kick a gang leader's ass for the hell of it."

"Nothing," she said sharply. Desperately. Because 'nothing' was the classic 'guilty kid' response when something unsanctioned was most definitely going on. And she was too unsettled to come up with anything better than nothing as a reply. She wasn't even sure anymore, why she'd goaded the man.

"What were you angry about?" he demanded.

_Everything._

"None of your business!" Anger made a very flimsy defense. She found herself wishing she had a stronger shield because anger wasn't working and fear was all that remained underneath. Fear was no defense at all, it was just that weight that kept holding her down.

She clenched her jaw, pursing her lips in that infuriating way she had when hitting him with yet another one of her refusals. _Obstinacy, thy name is Temperance Brennan_, he thought acidly. And yet he had to admit he loved the challenge.

"I'm going to find out," he warned her.

But instead of growing more combative, as he expected, Brennan went pale. Afraid. She knew he would discover it, because he was so very skilled at manipulation and she was too wrung out to evade him. "Booth, leave me alone."

"Ortiz reminded you of something," he stated, knowing instinctively that he was right. "Someone hurt you." His eyes narrowed, watching the transformation as she tried to suppress a memory that frightened her. The thing she didn't want him to know was still tormenting her. It was fear: fear was the engine that had begun driving her crazy from the moment this case started in Little Salvador.

A word tickled the back of his mind, something the man had said and she'd reacted to it. Booth closed the distance she'd put between them, determined to ferret out what he sensed she wanted to hide. She eyed him warily.

"What did he say to you?"

"Nothing worth repeating." She wished he would back off, stop pushing. She couldn't cope with both her partner's persistence and the threatened onslaught of past horror coming back in a torrent. Angela didn't push, but Booth was a cop. He was paid to push, to dig under layers of deception until he flipped over the dark and sordid truths people wanted to hide. And he was very good at his job.

Booth quoted the man, remembering the words that had chased her out of the interrogation room. "'I'll be your adorin' Salvadoran.'"

His partner flinched and then went very still, reminding him of prey scenting a predator that had come too close. She was almost crystalline from tension. She didn't say anything.

"You were upset because he made a pass at you."

"It wasn't that." Her eyes had gone dark like a stormy sky. She held herself even more tightly than before, so brittle she looked about to break.

Thinking back, Booth replayed the interview in his mind. '_I'll be your adorin' Salvadoran_.' And then the kissing lips directed at her. And her face, ashy grey, just before she ran away.

"It was the kissing thing," Booth realized.

Brennan's face was ashen now, too. She bit her lip, turned her body away from him. "No."

He stepped to her side, determined to flush the truth out of her. "Don't lie to me. I know when you're lying."

"Please stop." She lifted suddenly glassy eyes to his, pleading with him to stop pushing.

"Tell me," he insisted.

Stress shook her voice, and she pressed her palm against his chest to push him back. "No, please just _stop_."

He did. He stopped, frozen by her desolate plea, swallowing his own sudden fear that he'd pushed too hard and she was going to fall off her shelf and shatter. Softly, he asked, "Was it that bad?"

So bad she wouldn't tell him. So bad she needed to fight a man who was stronger and meaner than she was, just to regain a sense of power. Her beautiful eyes were shadowed, revealing just enough to make his head spin and his stomach heave.

"Bones, did someone..." and he choked, unable to say it. His will contracted with the singular recognition that he did not want her to say it, that he could not bear to know after all.

She said nothing. Just looked down and bit her lip and waited for something, for the rest of his question.

Sucking in a painful breath, he carefully reached for her, letting his fingers brush her arm but not curling them around. She could easily withdraw from his touch, if she wanted to. His heart throbbed with fear over the worst possibilities, and he stumbled over the promise with clumsy words. "You don't have to start fights, okay? You're ... you've got _me_. You're safe. I'll protect you."

Sending up a silent prayer that she would let him protect her, that God would help him keep her safe, he wished he could pull her closer and just wrap himself around her like a bullet proof vest.

Lifting her guarded gaze to his, she seemed to withdraw, to coil in on herself. "I'm not helpless."

"Please, Temperance, just this once, let me be the man." _Let me be your man,_ he wished silently. _Let me protect you._

"I don't need you to be a man," she muttered.

Booth reached for her again, cautiously, but certain he knew what she would allow. Planning his proposal very carefully, he took her hand and pulled her over to sit beside him on the sofa. "I know you don't need me. But _I_ need this. Okay? I'm the one who needs to feel like I'm doing my job. It's my job to keep you safe."

"Says who," she snorted.

"Cullen, my boss."

Her brow furrowed and she looked the question.

"When I proposed taking you out of the lab, taking you with me, he laid down the law. _'If you take a squint into the field, she's your responsibility.'_ Your safety is my responsibility."

"I can take care of myself," she insisted.

"It was one of the conditions I had to accept in order to let you leave the lab. You are a _civilian_, Bones. My job is to protect civilians."

Brennan didn't respond for a long moment, her eyes downcast while she worked what he'd just told her into what was bothering her. He didn't protect Rosa Vargas and she was also a civilian.

When she finally returned her direct gaze onto his, he sensed she was going to tell him something after all. And he wasn't going to like it, that was why she was hesitating. "In El Salvador, the cops often lead the death squads." Her voice trembled again as she skated too close to revealing things neither could bear to hear. "That's why she was so scared of you. When the police come to your house in El Salvador, they're coming to kill you."

He looked sick, just as she knew he would.

"She thought you were going to kill her, and you wanted me to translate threats." She broke a little, wiping tears away. "You don't know what it's like, to be terrified of the police."

"But you do," he acknowledged softly as an entirely different kind of sick realization swept over him. She'd cried and begged him not to threaten Rosa Vargas. She'd screamed and hit him once. _"You are a bully! You use your badge and your gun to intimidate people!"_ In his memory he saw her eyes flash fear and hatred that day in the hallway. She'd been terrorized by the police in some damn third world country, and now she worked with the police. Now she _was_ the authority she'd feared. No wonder she was acting a bit crazy about this case.

What she said next supplied the missing piece that made a complete picture finally emerge. "I feel safe with you."

Ohhh... This must be what Angela had hoped he would find out. It all made a twisted, tragic sense and he shook his head as it all came together. "You beat him up because you felt safe with me nearby."

She nodded, eyes averted and cheeks tingeing faintly pink.

He blew out a breath, completely overwhelmed. Oh, sweet Jesus he was going to be sick. She'd assaulted Ortiz because she thought he would keep her safe. She _was_ letting him protect her. It was such a heavy admission that he sensed they both needed to retreat and _dear God_ he needed time to think this through.

~Q~

When the news came in that the Mara Muerte gang had put a hit out on his 'lady scientist,' Booth drove straight out to the barrio. He waited two hours for Ortiz. The confrontation lasted only a minute, but it was long enough to shove the message deeply into the man's mouth. "She's my partner. If anything happens to her, I will kill you."

Glaring into his eyes, Booth ensured Ortiz knew the only reason he was still breathing was so he could get that hit retracted. They understood each other.

"Now, I've got somewhere that I gotta be."

Saving her life made him late, which meant he was going to have a different kind of hell to pay right here on earth. He trotted over to join Brennan as the funeral she'd arranged dispersed and all he got from her was a chilly reserve before she turned away. Angela eyed him with obvious disapproval when he asked, "Am I in trouble?"

"You're late to a funeral. Of course you're in trouble."

Turning back to him, Brennan's face was impassive, a sure sign of storms ahead. "Where were you." It was a demand.

"I had something to take care of," he hedged.

"More important than a funeral?"

Was that disgust or disappointment, he wasn't sure. Either way, he would take whatever she dished out because it meant she was there to throw heaping spoonfuls of her displeasure at him. "I thought so at the time."

She rolled her eyes and peeled away. Yep, definitely disgust. Booth sighed and knew he'd just scooped out and tossed away a few heaping shovelfuls of the hard-won trust between them.

Angela reached out for his arm and explained exactly what he'd managed to mess up. "She wanted you to be here so they could see that not all cops are bad. She wanted them to know they could trust you."

Well, _that_ just made it all worse, didn't it. A lump of emotion caught him by the throat. He looked at her retreating back, wishing he could explain. Instead a colorful curse streaked past his lips before he could stop it, causing Angela to lift an amused brow. "Really? And you call yourself a Catholic."

He hissed, "Damn it, I didn't have a choice!"

"About swearing in a cemetery?"

Dear God, squints were going to be the death of him. Still keeping his voice low, he whispered his fierce defense. "It's my fault, okay? She beat that heap of shit up because of _me_. It's my responsibility to clean up the mess."

Her eyes widened. Without him having to spell it out, she got it. He watched the color drain out of her face. "Did you?" she asked fearfully.

"I sure as hell hope so."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: The episode dropped hints but it's knowing the actual history of El Salvador that makes Brennan's behavior clear to me. In El Salvador, the police were government assassins. (In a way, so is Booth.) She's torn between her feelings of trust for Booth and the terror he's unknowingly inflicting on the Salvadoran people in this case simply by being a cop.

As for Booth, this is the only time in the show's history that he actually threatens to _murder_ someone. Now you know why...


	16. The Tease and the Rebel

Author's Note: After all that passion and angst, everyone needs a bit of a break. Don't let the levity fool you, however. Evolution never stops, it just keeps piling on little changes here and there, and they all accumulate and accumulate ... and it's not until you look back later that you finally see the difference. Often change happens while you're not paying attention.

* * *

~Q~

~The Tease and the Rebel~

~Q~

**Noble lady!**  
**Come, go with us; speak fair: you may salve so,**  
**Not what is dangerous present, but the loss**  
**Of what is past.**

_Coriolanus, Act III, Scene 2_

~Q~

Phone calls at five am seldom herald good news.

As Brennan flew through her usual morning routine at high speed, she mused over the number of times she'd received hyper-urgent calls such as this in the last three years: exactly twice, and this was the second one. The first had come from Booth at a more civilized hour, regarding the apparent suicide bombing death of a man linked with the President of the United States. Homeland Security had been 'chewing on the bit' on that one, desperate for a rapid identification of the man involved in the explosion. (This was a curious horse metaphor Booth had used and she still wasn't sure why chewing on something small would denote a desire for haste; apparently horses expressed their anxiety in ways that differed from humans. Anxious people, she'd noticed, tended to pace and make unreasonable demands.)

This morning it was the US State Department that was chewing on bits and demanding she drive out to the site where a small private jet had crashed after attempting an emergency landing less than an hour previously. They'd chewed on Dr. Goodman's bits, and he in turn had chewed on hers. Consequently, by the time she reached the scene, Brennan was feeling somewhat masticated.

She met Zack at the edge of a golf course in Virginia, when the early morning sun was still filtering at a 33 degree angle and mist still clung to the trees. Together they drove toward the crash site in a golf cart, her first such excursion. Zack prattled his confusion over why the FBI (Booth, to be precise) was not involved in this investigation and she occupied herself with wondering why Zack was talking about missing Booth when the agent never even spoke to him. As they neared the scene, she could see smoke curling upwards and the olfactory assault of burned fuel and fauna was nearly overwhelming. Some scents were so strong they could be tasted.

In the process of missing Booth, Zack managed to offend the site coordination officer. Brennan sighed and reminded Zack they didn't need "an FBI Agent to mediate our interpersonal interactions." They didn't need Booth to do their jobs here, despite what either Booth or Zack might have to say about it. Sending her a doubt-filled look, her increasingly disloyal protégé bent toward the cockpit and began making an assessment.

She didn't need Booth to do her job, but eventually she would be paired up with him again. The trouble was, her own innate honesty reminded her, after that evening in her office she wasn't sure how to work with Booth or what to say to him. Their balance had shifted them into new positions that had yet to be tested on a case and she was unsettled every time she thought about seeing him.

Within moments Zack was rambling out the preliminary observations with such dexterity that Brennan felt comfortable wandering a few feet away. She listened to him with half an ear, her mind at work on the situation with Booth and eyes tracking over the seared ground. The scent of burnt electrical wires, singed metal and meat grilled-to-the-bone commingled in her nostrils, making her seriously reconsider the allure of the barbeque.

As she got a bit further away and his droning faded into a background hum, Brennan halted. Luminous white glowed against the charred earth, a rounded lump of … _bone_, she realized with surprise … right there in the midst of airplane wreckage and shattered, burned human remains. White on black; out of place, it didn't belong.

Brennan dropped low, tenderly lifting the rounded, weathered chunk. Inside her skull, something screeched like the high-pitched scream of engines, like the terrified shrieks of the damned on board a doomed plane, but hollow and muffled. A different kind of doom: singular, lonely.

She turned it slowly, feeling the roughened signs of erosion slightly catch on her tight nitrile gloves. As her eyes skimmed over the bonescape, she saw the linear grooves, rippling over one side like waves. Chilled by the implication as much as by the crisp March breeze that blew icy breath over her exposed face and neck, Brennan stared at the small chunk until Zack appeared at her elbow complaining that she wasn't paying attention.

"What do you make of this?" She proffered the bone, letting him touch it.

He showed no recognition of its importance, but he did grasp its humanity. "Femur fragment," he murmured.

"No charring," she remarked softly.

Zack had never had any trouble following the path of logic. "You think this is not part of the plane crash."

He was here before the plane, beating near impossible odds. Ten million to one, Zack supplied, were the chances of a person being hit by a crashing airplane. As he had demonstrated when he instantly noticed the distinct differences that set two burnt skull shards apart as belonging to two different individuals, Zack's ability to detect minutia rivaled Brennan's. Within moments he, too, had noticed the kerf marks that had frozen his mentor.

The lonely bone came back to her and warmed her palm. Clutching it tightly, she threw her energies into finding its companions while Zack began cataloging the crash victims. Within an hour, she had two more pieces of a man who had died anonymously, in much the same way as the jet passengers: trapped, screaming, only to end up shattered over a golf course.

The difference was, nobody else cared about the mysterious man who'd been scattered there first.

As Brennan switched her attention back to the blackened remains she'd been summoned to gather, her mind strayed to the puzzle of the white bones. Something about them kept calling out to her, nagging her. Her thoughts were trapped and screaming, reaching forward to grasp … something. Something missing.

~Q~

The nagging sense of something missing followed Brennan into Dr. Goodman's office and scratched at her conscience during the unusually urgent staff meeting. The noise of protest grew louder when he commanded her to focus 100% on identifying the victims of the plane crash. Five of those six sets of blackened bones belonged to people who were already known and had died in a documented accident. The identity of the sixth person, she reasoned, was a question of politics since the NTSB was claiming certainty that it was an accident due to mechanical failure and not deliberate.

The white bones, meanwhile, were cut up by a saw. They'd been out there for at least four or five years. After being dismissed she paced her office for a few minutes, agitated by the political hamstringing and wondering if horses had the right idea. Here was a bit too big to chew on alone: Anonymous, human, dismembered, dispersed. _Murder._

Murder meant Booth.

Hadn't she just informed Zack that very morning that they didn't need the Special Agent from the FBI? Hadn't she finally admitted to herself that she didn't know how to face him? Pausing, considering, she frowned as the impetus to find the missing pushed back her pride. With a resigned sigh Brennan moved toward her phone. She could dial the number by memory now, both his direct line and his cell phone.

"Bones!" he answered jauntily.

"Yes, I ... have some." Still feeling embarrassed to be seeking him out, she untangled her tongue into a fumbled greeting.

He chuckled lightly but when she did not mirror his humor he fell silent. After a long pause he saw his error. "Oh, you were being serious."

She frowned. "Of course. I have some bones from a murder victim."

"Oh." He laughed again, but at himself this time. "Never-mind."

"What did you think I meant?"

"'Never-mind' means it's not worth repeating," he instructed patiently.

"Were you making a joke," she finally ventured.

Another chuckle. "No, I was hoping you were. … And now you're making that face."

"What face?"

"The one where your brow is folded up like an accordion and your cute little nose is trying to crawl up there and hide."

The expression he'd just described intensified. "Noses do not crawl, Booth." Did he just call her nose _cute?_! What did that mean?

"Bones, this might possibly be the most inane conversation I've ever had."

It was so much safer to focus on vocabulary that she smiled and gave her approval of his word choice. "Inane. Nice word."

"Thank you. Now, what were you saying about some bones?"

"I have three, from a golf course. Want to see them?"

"I'll show you mine if you show me yours."

Blankly, she asked. "Yours...? Do you have a body?"

"Oh why do I even bother," he groaned. "I'll be there in an hour."

As she replaced her phone in the cradle, Brennan turned to see Angela leaning in at the doorway wearing a bemused grin because the end of the conversation she'd just overheard sounded intriguing enough to make her eavesdrop. Without even thinking Brennan asked, "What do you suppose he meant?"

"What did who mean?"

"Booth said, 'I'll show you mine if you show me yours.' We were talking about bones."

Angela burst out a ribald laugh.

Brennan frowned, bewildered. "What? Is it a joke?"

Trying to pull herself together, Angela barely managed to hold her humor in check while she instructed gravely, "I think you should ask him what he meant." Then another snicker slipped out as she returned to her original goal of searching out Hodgins. "Let me know what shade of red he turns."

It couldn't possibly mean what Angela was implying, yet the consideration of what might make Seeley Booth blush left Brennan nearly blushing herself. She vowed she would indeed ask him, but her interest was derailed when she looked up from the small bones an hour later. Booth walked into the Bone Room and made the space feel smaller. His smile splashed over her before dropping to the forlorn trio of forgotten calcium bits. Seeing so little, he paused and blinked and then walked right up to her wearing an entirely different kind of smile.

She was sure it was different. His eyes were warmer and teasing. "That's all you got?"

It had been a few weeks since the Salvadoran case and it was oddly quiet as far as FBI homicides were concerned. Their paths hadn't crossed professionally since then and they hadn't spoken in all this time, and he'd missed her. He really had. After he'd had to miss the funeral and the weeks passed without a call, Booth had to admit he'd been afraid she was going to stay angry with him.

The fact that she had finally called him out of the blue was surprising (as well as a relief), but coming up against the paltry excuse she'd manufactured to bring him here made him grin. Those bits of bone were nothing to build a case upon; Brennan must have missed him, too. He was just about positive, no matter how much she might try to obfuscate it, that she'd missed him enough to invent a case out of scraps, and he was going to give her just a little hell over it. (Only because she'd made him wait so long of course, not because he loved seeing her flustered and furious.)

As the jittery silence pulled oxygen out of the room, Brennan tried to compensate by immediately commencing her dissertation. "Zack and I were called to the site of an airplane crash that had five registered persons and one unexpected passenger. While we were recovering victims of the crash, I found _these_. They're human, left on the golf course about five years ago. Dr Goodman is insisting that we ignore them and identify the sixth body on the plane because there were Chinese diplomats on board and apparently unscheduled passengers on diplomatic flights constitute an urgent international incident, which means the State Department thinks it's in charge of the Jeffersonian."

As her nervous air supply was finally exceeded, she trailed off and found he was watching her steadily with those velvet brown eyes. And that odd, flirty little grin hadn't departed yet.

"Got it? Or do you want me to explain again?" she asked, gathering enough of her sagging composure to smirk right back.

"No, I got it, okay? The plane goes down. Kablooey! There's an extra body on board, which you don't really care about 'cause you're more interested in these bone …" he reached towards the bone bits and she playfully swatted his hand back "...fragments that you found on the ground."

"Exactly."

"This all you got?" he asked again and even she sensed there was some sort of innuendo hiding under his raised brow.

"So far," she replied with a hint of defensiveness and nudged each bone with forceps. "A piece of skull, chunk of vertebra, part of a femur."

"Not much to go on," he pointed out. Again, something not quite resembling amusement colored his words, and his eyes never left hers. If she didn't know better, Brennan might have guessed he was waiting for something else to entice him.

Hoping to capture his interest (in the bones) she leaned forward and insisted, "These fragments came from a person who was _hacked_."

The lingering grin transformed itself into a wince. "Hacked to little bits?"

"No, medium-sized bits. I'm not sure how they turned into little bits yet."

He glanced down at the bones with pursed lips, then back at her. Brennan was more skilled at playing coy than he'd anticipated. "Okay, and I'm here … why?"

"Dismemberment. Little bits. It's a murder."

There it was, not show and tell but a subtle excuse to see him. Shaking his head, the smirk was returning. "The FBI doesn't have jurisdiction at a golf course."

It was not the answer she was expecting. "Who does?"

"I don't know," he flipped. "Try the PGA."

Brennan's eyes flashed at him, annoyance, and a hint of disappointment. "Uh huh," he chuckled, finally satisfied that she was giving herself away. "You know, you've done a couple of cases without me, and you miss me."

Her gaze flew up to his, the denial swift and cool. "Zack misses you, not me."

Almost crowing, he declared, "Zack and I don't even talk."

"He seems to think it's a male bonding ritual." And where could he possibly have gotten _that_ idea, she wondered sarcastically.

"Maybe he's right," Booth countered so fast she knew it couldn't possibly be.

Scoffing, she insisted, "No it's not."

"Could be."

"You told him that so you wouldn't have to talk to him!"

"Well, it was nicer than shooting him!"

A growl and a glare mixed in her as she resisted the urge to strangle him. "Goodman has ordered me to investigate the other extra body."

She was an obedient little squint (most of the time) which meant this was all a ruse and he would prove it with a tease. "Well then, you better get on that. Next time, you know, you miss me? Pick up the phone, call me. We'll do lunch."

Her mouth dropped open as she began sputtering. "I do not miss you!"

Flustered first, every time. Almost laughing at how easy it was, he leaned closer. "You miss me. Come on, say it."

Those beautiful eyes flashed fire and resistance. "I do not miss you."

Furious next, every time. God, he'd missed her and the sparks that flew between them. "Yes, you do."

"Agent Booth? Dr. Brennan?"

They both swiveled their heads, the spat interrupted by a Jeffersonian security officer announcing she had a visitor in her office.

"No I don't," she insisted and turned away.

His teasing followed her. "You miss me."

He fell into step behind her and a moment later she felt the warm hand at her back. _I did miss him_, she silently admitted to herself.

~Q~

The visitor introduced himself and an entirely different source of tension when he revealed his knowledge of high ranking Chinese officials on board the doomed flight and his suspicions that the bones Brennan had found belonged to his father. The three departed to Wong Fu's to hash out their positions, leaving Brennan caught in the center of rival-males-over-female / law-enforcement-over-victims'-rights posturing that rivaled every tribal display she'd ever encountered.

Booth whistled disapprovingly as Jesse Kane finally stepped away and took his oppressive presence with him. "Whew. Pushy."

Brennan leaned over and scolded. "Well, maybe he discovered that being pushy is how you get cops to pay attention." It seemed bones found on golf courses weren't enough.

He recognized her complaint was about his reluctance to help her with those little bone scraps, which he still hadn't agreed to, and that was what set him on the defensive. "What are you hawking at me for?" Booth asked impatiently.

"The Chinese, the plane crash … that's geopolitics. This is murder."

He sighed. Maybe it hadn't been a ruse—she really was obsessed with those boney bits.

"Will you help?"

Of course he was going to help. There was never any doubt of that, but he certainly wasn't going to let her think she'd had him at 'I have bones.' He had to appear properly put out and reluctant before caving in to her irresistible (and mercifully unconscious) charm or there'd be no telling what she might ask him to do next. "Well, I guess if you're really asking me, I guess I could, uh, fudge it with my boss to make it look like it was attached to the Chinese plane crash thing."

Her genuinely pleased smile was reward enough.

"Why are you so interested in those three little bones," he asked after another bite of steak slathered in A-1.

Brennan took a bite of her lunch, chewing thoughtfully while her chop sticks moved food around her plate. "Something about the way they feel."

"How do they feel?" He wondered, not for the first time, what she felt when she picked up bones. Recalling what Angela had told him, that bones spoke to Bones, he waited for her to explain what she meant.

"Lost, forgotten." She lifted her clear grey eyes to his, giving him a glimpse of Tempe and he knew that this was the reason Jesse Kane never looked away from her. "It was a person, Booth. Nobody cares."

"Jesse Kane certainly seems to care." Did that come out sounding snide?

It must have; Brennan was looking at him strangely. "Why were you so mean to him?"

"I wasn't mean."

"Yes you were."

"I'm just being cautious."

Here it came, the crease in her brow as she went analytical on him. "Why?"

"You really want to know why?" he growled.

"Yes."

Of course she did. She was a scientist and curiosity was part of the pleasing package, along with freakish intelligence and the use of words so big he'd begun carrying an eight-pound Oxford dictionary in the trunk of his SUV just so he could understand her. (How the hell else was he going to be able to use words like 'inane' in a coherent sentence? Or 'coherent,' for that matter...)

She wanted to know and he was the one feeling reckless this time. "Fine. I'll tell you. I don't like the way he looked at you."

Her mouth dropped open for a moment, then her eyes turned flinty and she viciously stabbed a chopstick into a watercress on her plate. "He didn't _'look at me,'_" she protested.

"Oh, yes he did. He was all over you."

"You have no—"

"Bones, you civilian, me cop. We've been over this."

"He just wanted our help."

Just wanted their help? No, the man just wanted _her_. Booth slammed down his fork, thoroughly frustrated that she could be so knowledgeable about five hundred different ways to dismember and dispose of a body but didn't notice a man practically undressing her with his eyes.

"He knows your name, where you work. He knows about your parents. He knows that a diplomatic flight carrying high-ranking Chinese officials crashed even though it has not been announced on the news. He even knows there's an extra body. And he knows you found three little teeny tiny bones on a golf course. He knows too much about you and what you do. I'm sorry, that freaks me out, okay? You don't like it? I don't care."

She was muttering ferociously. Booth was pretty sure he heard something about 'alpha male' and 'not gonna let him' … ruin her life? Save it? He didn't care. She was his partner and he was going to watch out for her, whether she liked it or not.

"So, now if there's any man that shows interest in me, you think you're going to run them through a background check?"

Oh hell yes he'd be checking out her dates for unpaid parking tickets, hidden psychotic tendencies, and every-damn-thing in between. And he knew exactly where he was going to start. "I'm sure as hell going to run Jesse Kane through a background check!"

"Fine. Knock the ball out."

The completely baffled glare she received almost dampened her outrage. She knew she'd messed up another phrase and ruthlessly tamped down her own need for precision. Let him bake on it. Stew. Whatever, as long as there was an unpleasant level of heat involved.

"Bones, either you want me to knock it out of the ballpark, which means you are wishing me success in running the background check; or you're hoping I'll injure myself in the process. Just for curiosity's sake, which one were you aiming for?"

"Both," she snapped.

"Fine. After I run him, I will hit myself with the results. Will that make you happy?"

"Yes." Finally realizing how ridiculous their argument had become, she shook her head and let a small grin soften her blow. "If you should require medical attention afterward, you can call me."

Leaning back, his annoyance with her eased up with the peace offering. "Are you going to come over and put band aids on my paper cuts?"

"I said you could call me, meaning to let me know you've fulfilled your promise of self-harm. I didn't say I'd be providing you with treatment." But she was smiling and their eyes held for a few seconds too long. She dropped out first, pushing her plate away and standing a little too hastily. "I'm going back to the lab."

"Great. I'll walk you back."

"Booth…" The resigned sigh indicated she knew it was futile to keep arguing.

"Partners do things together." He stood up also, flinging enough money onto the table to cover their meals. "Besides," he continued, "you're not gonna carry that heavy banker's box all the way back to the Jeffersonian all by yourself."

"No, I'm not." The saccharine smile should have warned him of her intentions. "_You_ are carrying it back to the Hoover because following paper trails is _your_ job, partner."

He rolled his eyes as he heaved up the heavy box. "_Now_ she plays the partner card..."

~Q~

Back at the lab, Brennan concentrated on the white bones while the others handled the plane crash identifications. When they came to update her on their progress, she enlisted their help in determining whether these bones belonged to Jesse Kane's father or not. Angela would attempt to match the skull shard to a photo, Zack would examine the kerf marks. Hodgins would help keep Goodman diverted.

Angela and Zack departed and Brennan had almost settled back into her examination when the question pulled her away.

"Why are you suddenly willing to buck authority and risk Goodman's wrath over these tiny bones?"

It was Hodgins who had asked, his large blue eyes intent on hers. They'd known each other the longest although the most tangentially. Always their interactions skimmed the edges but never penetrated their respective bubbles, except for one time when he'd refused to go to a charity gala for the Jeffersonian and had enlisted her solidarity in the form of a minor rebellion against her editors. "Fight coercion in all its forms," he'd urged with a conspiratorial grin.

Now he was gleefully involved in her endeavor to disobey Goodman's orders, eager with his offer to help her hide her activities if it meant they would be resisting the State Department's pressure to sideline compassion and justice. He'd been the first to volunteer, ahead of her best friend and her intern. It touched her more deeply than she could articulate to have his support.

In reply to his question, Brennan lifted the skull shard and turned it under her fingers in frustration. "Did you ever have the feeling that you were missing something obvious? I'm missing something here. I can feel that I'm close and yet missing it by millimeters."

"And it's making you a little crazed," he chuckled. "Is that it? Because rebellion isn't your thing."

Her striking gaze flew up to meet his again, but a little grin tugged at the edge of her lips. "Not usually. But I've always favored new experiences."

"Like spouting off about government cover-ups, sticking it to the Man and risking your job? That's _my_ usual role around here." He lifted his wrist and playfully flicked at the green rubber band. "It's kind of fun to have someone else be the mad professor."

"Is that why you're so willing to help me," Brennan countered curiously.

He glanced down at the little bones, and his usual burning intensity seemed to dial down a degree or two. "It's the little people who get trampled the most."

Brennan nodded. She imagined a stampede and clouds of obscuring dust, and yet she knew that was not what he meant. As if he'd heard her, Hodgins echoed what she'd thought in Goodman's office. "This guy wasn't a diplomat so as far as our government is concerned, he's going to be buried and ignored. It's genocide on a scale of one."

"Genocide by definition can not be restricted to a scale of one, but ... I concur with the sentiment."

"I know. It's one of the things I admire about you." He shrugged sheepishly. "Rebellions are born from moments like these."

Brennan snorted lightly. "So I'm a rebel."

Hodgins leaned closer. "With a rebel yell, she cried more, more, more..."

"I don't know..."

"...What that means," he laughed. "I know. I also have faith in your ability to satisfy your curiosity and find the answers you seek. _All_ of the answers." With that, he gestured to the bones and left her to find what was missing.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: A rollicking nod to Casket4mytears, who might just be a rebel as she rewrites history both real and imagined.


	17. The Rival for her Attention

Author's Note: An FYI to my readers: finals are rapidly approaching. I am not finished with this story so I will try to keep updating on the once per week schedule. However, if I miss a week, know that it's only studying and research that is preventing me from writing (not writer's block!). I will try to make up any skipped updates after March 20th when I'll have Spring Break.

~Q~

Monday night's episode (The Fact in the Fiction) touched on what this chapter is all about. (I won't spoil it, though. If you've seen it, you may recognize it here and if you haven't seen the episode, you'll have no idea but still will get what is needed out of this chapter.)

Speaking of getting what we need, we've come a long way from the beginning, haven't we? All those little changes are starting to accumulate and the effect they're having is manifesting slowly for our characters. Do you see what's going on? Can you guess what's going to happen?

Oh, and, about the title...? It may or may not be what you think. ;)

* * *

~Q~

~The Rival for her Attention~

~Q~

**Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,**  
** Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel.**  
_Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 3, Line 62_

~Q~

After a day spent dodging Goodman and examining the bone shards using every means at her disposal, limited though they were, Brennan entered the ninth post-meridian hour with a bare scrap of something to report when Jesse Kane fulfilled his promise to call her. He agreed to meet her at a grimy all night diner and over stale, bitter cups of coffee with brassy bubbles floating in the cups, she told him what little she knew.

"So the bone fragments are the same sex and age as my father," he summarized.

"Yes." She wasn't sure how he sounded. Not exactly satisfied, not hopeful, not upset. Suspended, perhaps. His voice stretched tight along a high wire while he balanced and waited to see whether he would remain up there or be pushed off. What fate did the bones conceal?

Jesse sighed. "Thank you."

She wasn't sure why he was so grateful. "It's a long way from conclusive." It wasn't anything, really. Especially, it wasn't relief. He was still up on the high wire, balancing and waiting.

"Yeah, I know. In times like these, it's hard to get hopeful." He was staring at his hands, wrapped around a scruffy brown porcelain cup that had gone through one thousand wash cycles and bore the marks from each and every one. Lifting his regard back to her, he continued, "But on the other hand, you've gotta have hope."

She raised a brow, genuinely curious. She'd clung to hope for fifteen years before finally giving up. Did he hope for the same thing she had, a living return? "Even after five years?"

"People are found after decades, Dr. Brennan. Even after centuries. You've done some of the finding."

But she only found them when they were dead.

Brennan watched Jesse with intense scrutiny, trying to understand him. He almost seemed to _want_ those bones to be his father; in his place, at 20 years of age, Brennan knew she would have been pleading with the universe not to make any bones be her parents. She wanted them alive. He seemed to want his father dead, a different kind of resolution. Still puzzled by him, Brennan deliberately said something insensitive because that was how Booth said it should be done: poke and prod and make the subject uncomfortable. "Booth says you've made a living off the disappearance of your father."

He nodded, his laugh a bit self-deprecating. "About six months after my father disappeared, I found out nobody was actually looking for him. Next thing I knew, I was an expert in motivating the police. Victim's rights." He shrugged.

Leaning in toward her, he returned her gaze with fervent intensity that contrasted sharply with the seeming indifference of a moment ago, and the constant connection proved almost more overwhelming than the things he said. It was sensory overload, the way he looked at her, the way he tried to see into her as Booth sometimes did. "Becoming well known is a by-product of my search for my father, not the goal of my search. You should understand my motivation better than most people in law enforcement."

It was too much, and the way he kept bringing up her parents singed and made her withdraw from the painful stimulus. With her typical brusqueness, she cut him off. "I'm not really interested in bonding over the loss of my parents."

She wasn't interested in being manipulated by her own grief, either.

If it offended him, he didn't show it; his gaze never wavered.

She glanced away again, unnerved because she'd finally understood what Booth meant about the way Jesse looked at her. She felt herself in a glass-walled observation room and the sense of invasion was unpleasant. It was so much more uncomfortable than when Booth looked into her, and though still uncertain what the difference was, Brennan decided this was a boundary she would only allow Booth to cross. Quietly, she drew down a shade over the glass, her partner's unspoken presence. "Booth is looking over your file now."

"I wasn't looking for _his_ help."

Brennan lifted her head as what Booth had said on the National Mall back in November came to mind. They were partners: you ask for one, you get the other. A package deal. With a trace of relief and commingled pride, she informed Jesse of the conditions he must accept in order to receive _her_ help. "We work together."

He looked skeptical.

If asked, she could not have explained the strength she felt, just knowing Booth was metaphorically present even when not literally standing at her side. They'd argued over Jesse's intentions, a fact that chafed earlier and soothed now. Defending him to Jesse came as second nature even if he wasn't present to hear it. She would not let Jesse question her partner's integrity, not even with a nonverbal smirk. "Booth knows the bones are evidence of foul play, that's all the motivation he needed."

"You didn't have to lean on him?" Jesse smirked a little more, guessing she'd had to push because Agent Booth had clearly demonstrated complete disinterest in the bones and fully masculine territoriality where the lovely Dr. Brennan was concerned.

She answered, "not at all."

And her enigmatic smile and softly uttered reply must have been what made him give up.

"If you say so," he finally capitulated.

"I do," she murmured. Brennan had known Booth was going to help her the moment he'd entered the Bone room wearing _that_ smile ... a full thirty minutes before she'd met Jesse Kane. "Booth is my partner."

~Q~

This was a situation Brennan had never found herself facing before. Caught up in a conspiracy against her boss that had begun the moment those forgotten bones had quivered in her palm, her own motivation shifted and stretched to accommodate a man who swore they were his father. She wasn't sure of that, (it didn't feel right), but Jesse Kane's drive to name the bones as _his_ rivaled her drive to name them as _someone_. Everyone she worked with fanned out to cover questions about identity, saw blades, and the process of elimination.

In a roundabout way, six people were now searching for the truth about one forgotten man.

The way Jesse kept bringing her own parents into the nexus was what confused her most. A day had passed and Booth was pushing and prying as he did so well. Jesse inserted himself into their work in a way that was reminiscent of Brennan's determined thrust into Booth's fieldwork over Cleo. Booth did not appreciate it. (But then he hadn't liked it when she was the one pushing her way forward, so...)

The echoes of her own past and Jesse's present kept distracting her.

Zack determined what kind of saw blade was used to mangle the bones into such small pieces (a wood chipper). Booth found her the actual wood chipper that belonged to the city where the golf course was located. Hodgins and Zack designed an experiment to help them figure out where to keep looking for additional bone fragments. Angela promised to sketch the edge of the golf course man's upper eye to confirm it could match Jesse Kane's father.

Booth pointed out Jesse had a good motive to want those bones to be his father (money he'd otherwise lose if his father wasn't declared dead before his stepmother spent his inheritance). Brennan was caught between them again as they lobbed their pitches at her. "He's not a member of the team!" said one and the other replied, "He doesn't understand what it's like."

They were both right and the bones weren't whole enough to speak, but Jesse asked to see them and she relented.

Three tiny pieces of someone lay forlornly on the table. It was a quirk of Brennan's precise nature that the bones had been placed in roughly anatomical positions relative to one another. Jesse began comforting himself with talk of bones and timelines, and then he poked his fingers into her wounds. "You don't have any of this."

What propelled her to do it, she could not have said. Maybe she just wanted his fingers touching something more tangible than her missing resolution. Brennan led him to her office and handed him what she had.

Holding the slender missing persons file on Matthew and Christine Brennan, Jesse looked up at Brennan in surprise. "This is all you have?"

"Yes," she sighed. "You were right about how little it is." The papers within declared Matthew and Christine Brennan, ages and address as stated, were reported missing by their teenaged children a few days before Christmas in 1991. Their car was found over 1000 miles away a few days later, with blood that matched her mother's ABO group. That was it, and it wasn't much.

"No, I mean, this is simply your copy of the official file."

She looked confused. "Yes. What else would there be?"

Incredulous, he asked, "You've never tried to hire any private investigators? Did any poking around by yourself?"

Bewildered and feeling suddenly that she'd failed some kind of test, Brennan shook her head. She'd been a foster kid clawing her way out of poverty for years. She'd struggled through university on scholarships and what she could earn through menial jobs while working on her PhDs. Since coming to the Jeffersonian, all she did was work. Where would she have found the time or money to do what Jesse was suggesting? And yet … he thought she should have.

"Well, I'm pretty new at field work. I've mostly been a lab rat my whole career. Plus, I trusted the authorities would do what they could." She'd been fifteen. What else could she do but trust the police back then? It was only since becoming an adult that Brennan had realized badges were simply metal shields that did not convey morals or magical powers.

"The authorities have rooms filled with files like these! _Warehouses_!"

Remembering what she'd told Angela a few weeks ago, Brennan sighed. You can't trust cops. And yet… "_I'm_ the authorities. Booth is the authorities."

"Did you ever show this file to Booth?"

"No." The shock struck her then, that she'd pushed and shoved over Cleo, over Maggie, countless murdered souls, even over three tiny pieces of bone, but she'd never pushed over her parents. Her eyes lowered in turmoil as she shook her head sadly. Booth was about murder, not missing. It was one thing to stop waiting, something entirely different to start looking for a corpse. "No," she repeated, still whirling with realignment. Had her parents been murdered?

Brennan couldn't have known how achingly beautiful she looked, nor did she do it on purpose, but whenever her grief spilled out of stormy eyes beautiful was too tame a word to use. It always hit bystanders with the force of a hurricane and Jesse was not prepared. Walking by the door to her office, Angela halted when she saw Jesse Kane's face transform from concern into awe and irresistible attraction and she knew in an instant what he was seeing; he was reacting to Tempe. She'd watched the same thing happen to Booth a few months ago, when he, too, had fallen under her grief-splashed spell. Fully ensnared, the lovestruck man impulsively leaned toward Tempe to kiss her.

No man was born yet who could resist Tempe, but Dr. Temperance Brennan could resist every man alive. She drew herself back sharply, her defenses erupting like a fortress wall to keep invaders out. "This is where I work."

"Which is my … cue." Angela moved in fast, wondering if she was going to have to stop Brennan from hitting the poor guy.

Brennan was just flustered enough to make Angela hope she might not have needed to rescue Jesse after all. When Brennan turned to look over the schematic she'd brought, Angela leaned toward Jesse. "As far as I know, (which is quite far, believe me), no one has tried to kiss Brennan in this office and lived to tell about it."

Then again, no one had ever tried to kiss Brennan in this office, period. This was progress, either way you looked at it.

~Q~

"We need to talk." Catching him as he entered the lab, Angela hustled him up into the loft break area and turned to give the warning. He had followed her willingly but reluctantly, and now waited impassively for to get to her point. So she did. "If you don't make a move pretty soon, you're going to miss your chance."

She quirked her brow at him and waited. Would he act like he didn't know what she was talking about, or could they finally get a few things out in the open.

Booth sighed patiently and indulged her, only slightly more half way. "Why do you think that?"

She studied him closely with her artist's eye, looking for emotional tells that would illuminate a portrait. The guarded eyes suggested his reluctance to discuss it, and yet revealed he probably knew what chance she was referring to. His lips turned a bit down at the corners, showing that he wasn't happy with the situation.

She thought she was about to add to that unhappiness. "Jesse Kane saw Tempe yesterday."

A dark shadow flew through his sable eyes but he wasn't giving anything away for free. "So, what … you think that makes him competition now?"

"That doesn't bother you?"

"It shouldn't," he replied sharply.

"It does," she insisted.

He looked away, as if considering whether it was worth the effort of denying what she said. Angela was perceptive and difficult to distract. Finally he sighed again and just admitted the truth. "It's not going to happen."

"With Jesse?"

"No, I mean Bones and me. _We_ aren't going to happen, not like that."

Angela shook her head, skeptical and now bewildered as well. "You want it to; I think she does, too."

Booth paced away, reaching into his pocket and pulling out his poker chip. He stared at it for a moment, then lifted it and showed it to the artist. "You know, relationships like that? Sometimes they don't last. Things can go wrong. She needs someone who will stay with her through everything, someone who will _never_ leave. This is the way to make that happen. We stay friends. That's it."

Shocked, she could only ask, "You're just going to stand on the sidelines? Is that enough?"

He shrugged. "For her, nothing is too much and everything is not enough."

"Do you realize that statement is completely nonsensical?"

He laughed because this was far from the first time he'd been told such, and her expression of confused disbelief was one he found himself facing on a regular basis. "You've truly become squint, Angela. You're starting to sound like her."

And to his surprise, a pleased smile blossomed in her eyes. "I'll take that as a compliment."

Nodding, he smiled back and shrugged. "I meant it as one."

~Q~

"While you're there, look for a large freezer."

Zack had said it. _Zack_.

Sitting in the car beside Booth on their way to hammer Ray Sparks, Brennan closed her eyes against the bright afternoon sunlight and worried her lapse back and forth in the confines of her shrinking brain. Zack had put together polyurethane with frozen; Zack had taken her usual leap. She had missed it all completely. Her pulse wilted beneath her ribs throughout the ride to Virginia, leaving her head fuzzy and her palms damp. So busy worrying about Jesse Kane and missing people she'd missed it? So busy letting Booth tease her, letting Hodgins incite rebellion, letting Angela approve of her nearly kissing a man in her office ... and she'd missed it.

If it wasn't for Zack and his hard focus on reason, it might have been missed.

The aging Queen Anne style home that Ray Sparks had killed his own brother over loomed deathly white ahead of her. Local police had nabbed him already, and reported that Sparks insisted his brother was still alive the last time he'd seen him. Plunging into a bleak basement where black shadows crawled out of all the corners, Booth strode over to the large freezer and affirmed that Sparks was an honest man. "Yeah, he was probably alive for about 30 minutes after being locked in here."

With Booth at her left, Brennan looked down into an empty freezer. Cold, stale air wafted upwards and the frostbitten walls were smooth. Recalling Zack's prediction, Brennan's eyes skimmed the upper edges and tripped over dribbles of blood scratched bilaterally into the sides and a broken fingernail hanging just under the edge of the polyurethane seal. A muffled, distant horror grappled against the inside of her mind. "What kind of person could lock a living human being into a freezer?"

The same kind of person who locked her into a car trunk, or threw children down wells. How could she have missed this?

"His own brother," Booth murmured, struck with the kind of revulsion she'd rarely seen in him. He was thinking about being in that small white space, trapped in black while the air ran out.

What shocked her the most was the sudden recognition that she didn't feel it this time. Spooked and trembling, Brennan almost forgot the prime directive of evidence retrieval as a need to wrap her fingers around the edges of the freezer asserted itself. She had to feel it, needed to orient herself into the dark confinement of the familiar. Touching evidence was forbidden and she needed to hold onto something, so she wrapped her nerveless fingers around her own humeri and shivered. She knew what was missing, at last, and the realization chilled her to the bone.

"You all right, Bones?" Booth pulled her gently away, concerned that she had grown so pale and chilled in proximity to the freezer.

Her dazed expression lifted towards his. "I didn't feel it."

"Didn't feel what?"

Brennan shook her head, feeling suddenly trapped outside the freezer with all of her senses cut off. She didn't see it, hear it, feel it. "I missed it."

Shrewdly guessing she was holding herself to an impossible standard, Booth tried to reassure her. "You know, sometimes I think you expect too much from yourself. You're not psychic."

The pronouncement had an unexpected flaying effect on her. Isn't that what Angela had teased once? "Of course not," she affirmed but knew it sounded weak.

He didn't understand but that shouldn't surprise her when she couldn't understand it either. Looking back at the freezer, Brennan forced herself to look into it, into herself. Perhaps not feeling it was a good thing. Drifting free in the absence of pain, she floated to the top of the stairwell with him, emerging back into the sunlight and wide open spaces with a sense of panic.

"The freezer. I should have..." What, she asked herself. Had a psychic link to entrapment through the bones? That was patently ridiculous. It was only empathy that she'd lost, empathy for the dead victim drowned out under her empathy for Jesse's still unfinished quest. Jesse's father was still unknown, and her parents.

Booth halted at the edge of the yard, and shook his head at her. "You didn't miss anything, okay? You found more pieces of the guy. You found that tumor. You were going to follow it up with area hospitals and yeah, maybe it would have taken us a day longer to get here but I did my thing and we got here by a shortcut. It was teamwork, Bones. You did not miss anything."

The only reason they were here was because of Zack, and Booth, Hodgins and Angela. Blinking back the sting in her eyes from the sinking sun, Brennan sighed and nodded.

"Want to head to Wong Fu's when this is over?"

What did it mean? Could this be good or was it a devastating loss that she hadn't felt the pain. Brennan shook herself and looked up again. "Sure. Um, I have to take care of something first, though."

~Q~

"I want you to do a favor for me."

"Ah, geez, another favor," Booth groaned. This was the risk he took in working with her, becoming malleable putty in her pretty hands.

"I wonder if you wouldn't mind taking a look at this." She slid a slender file folder towards him with a shy hesitation that was quite unusual.

"The file on your parents?" He was surprised, pleasantly. "Yeah, okay."

"You want to think about it," she offered. "It's a pretty big favor."

Without even pausing, he acknowledged, "You'd do it for me." She had done it with Epps, staying awake for two days helping him retrieve facts long scattered to the winds.

"I would," she agreed.

Lifting his head to meet her gaze, Booth said softly, "I'm proud you asked me, Temperance."

Their eyes met, pooling warmth and a relief into her that chased away the afternoon's freezer burn. As she stood uncharacteristically tongue-tied, Zack wandered over and made a comment about the successful conclusion of their case. Booth casually tossed some peanuts into his mouth and remarked (to her) that he'd look into it. Zack hesitated for a moment, but then he caught on and his face softened into a gratified smile as he retreated.

Brennan sighed in exasperation."You're back to ignoring Zack?"

Booth defended that it worked for him and made Zack happy. He shrugged a little, but looked to her for understanding and perhaps to show that he understood her, too. "Your people are my people."

"I have people?" It hadn't occurred to her, until that moment. She glanced back at Angela flirting with Hodgins; Zack watching with a bemused lack of comprehension; and Booth sitting at the bar with her life in his hands. Every single one of them had helped her solve the mystery of the white bones over the last few days. She'd missed it but they'd come through.

And then she relaxed. She wouldn't have to feel the pain any longer; she had people who would help her compensate. A fierce joy and satisfaction surged through her fingers and warmed her all the way through.

"Hey ... I have people." She said it slowly, savoring the way it sounded.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Considering her reaction to Maggie, Brennan had a far more subdued reaction to this poor guy who was locked alive into a freezer. And yet, she was still obsessed with his bones. What could it all mean...?

~Q~

If you recall, this story started from a double dare. (I dared Casket to write about a personal item of Booth's coming back to haunt him, she dared me to write about Brennan and ghosts.) That other story is out this week, clawing its way into the light of day. If you haven't already, go find **The Ring in the Reflecting Pool** by Casket4mytears and see what fun prompted these two stories.


	18. The Found and the Lost

Author's Note: Okay, so, um, we're not going to revisit Two Bodies in the Lab.

*Ducking now until you've used up your supply of rotten vegetables.*

Not that I don't love that episode, but if I went to every wonderful place the show has to offer, this story would go on forever. I know you say you'd like it to go on a long time, but I suspect you still want the story to be going somewhere. Believe it or not, there's no aimless wandering on this trip. It's all mapped out and we're getting close to the first big plateau.

* * *

~Q~

~The Found and the Lost~

~Q~

**The shadow of my sorrow! ha! let's see:**  
**'Tis very true, my grief lies all within;**  
**And these external manners of laments**  
**Are merely shadows to the unseen grief**  
**That swells with silence in the tortured soul;**

_History of Richard II, Act IV, Scene 1, Line 2287_

~Q~

"You didn't need to come out here."

The two of them walked out the door and before the sentence had fully emerged a solid hand of heat swatted her, rushed into her lungs and right back out again taking with it every molecule of cool oxygen they had contained. Dry desert heat hits fast and hard for those more used to East Coast humidity. She paused to gasp a little while her body adjusted to the radical temperature change and Angela's comment.

"Of course I did, Angela." She wheezed out the rejoinder, volume stolen by burning air. Of course she would rush out here to broil alive inside her own skin. Replaying the phone call that had sent her scurrying for the fastest flight to Santa Fe, Brennan shook her head at the mere suggestion that she would not have dropped everything the moment she knew what her friend was going through.

"Why didn't you call me sooner?" Brennan tossed her duffel bag into the trunk and walked to the passenger side of the car.

Her friend sighed, slamming her door shut. "It's not like Kirk hasn't lost track of time before. There was no reason to call."

Brennan faced her over the transmission hump, still concerned because she'd heard it in her voice, almost felt the thickness of barely restrained tears when Angela had explained the reason for her call. Gently, she pushed, "Do you think that skull is Kirk's?"

Their eyes held. No one else would ask her such a direct question, because no one else knew what Angela could see. Angela dropped her gaze a second later. "I'm not objective. I don't want it to be Kirk so, you know, I keep looking for things that make it not him."

"That's why you want me to look?" Brennan clarified.

Angela shrugged. "You're better at keeping your feelings separate. If it's him, you'll know."

"Maybe," Brennan agreed, "but it's not always clear to me. You know, lately..."

"Brennan, it was just that one—"

"No," she interrupted. "It's not just the one time. It's ... something has changed."

The car starting introduced noise, the absence of which Brennan had begun to anticipate more often now. Not hearing the noise that filled the background and fluctuated when she touched bone had plunged Brennan into a silent void. She was still doing her job and aside from Angela no one had noticed the deficiency, yet the loss was still deafening, making her feel as if a sense had been cut off.

"You're happier now." Angela threw the car into gear and headed away from the airport. "That's what has changed."

Surprised, Brennan glanced over at her. "What makes you say that?"

She laughed. "Oh, come on. Look at the evidence. You smile, you make jokes. (Bad ones.) Booth takes you to lunch, Hodgins doesn't make you growl anymore. You've gone out with David a couple of times."

Booth hated David. Unbidden, the memory of Booth blocking her view, waving his hand in her face to get her to look back at him brought a small smile out of her. Somehow that memory pleased her more than the delayed dinner at Nolita's a week ago. David was kind but rather bland. "I don't think that's going to go anywhere," she admitted.

"Why not?"

"I don't know. He's nice but, he's just not..."

"Booth?" Angela glanced at Brennan, knowing the denial was going to be swift as a falcon's dive.

It came in the form of an exasperated sigh. "Angela..."

"What? You know, Hodgins says you were pretty glad to see him when he found you at that warehouse."

The car had exited the airport and Angela busied herself for the next few minutes navigating traffic. If Brennan closed her eyes, she could feel herself back in that windowless room, strung up and waiting while the dogs howled for her blood. As the terror would start to close in again, she would sense Booth falling down in front of her to remove the ashy tasting cloth that robbed her mouth of moisture. Feel him lifting her away from harm and into his arms and the way he held her so tightly, as if she were something precious that he'd nearly lost.

No one had ever embraced her that way.

"Of course I was glad to see him. He saved my life."

"I think it was more than that," Angela contradicted gently. "Because even Hodgins saw it."

Swallowing a sudden catch in her throat, Brennan turned away and stared out the window. "We're just friends. We're partners."

"Yeah, I know," Angela surrendered. "Tell me something I haven't heard before."

"The Navajo call themselves the Diné, which means 'the people.' According to their creation myth, they emerged into this world, the Fourth World, from an origin underground. White, black, yellow and turquoise represent the four boundaries of their land and are featured heavily in both their art and in religious ceremonies, which often include elaborate sand paintings that are immediately erased at the ceremony's conclusion." She trailed off when she noticed Angela giving her a wry glance. "Oh... you didn't really want trivia."

"I'm an artist, Sweetie." Angela sounded tolerantly amused. "I know about the sand paintings."

"Oh." Brennan redirected her thoughts, and after a moment she asked hesitantly, "Do you want me to tell you something you really haven't heard before?"

A sigh. A tired smile. "Nothing about anthropology. What else have you got?"

"I think you might be right."

A startled and amused glance heralded an equally shocked response. "Well there you go. I definitely haven't heard that before, not from you."

Brennan frowned, not finished and fairly certain what she was thinking was not amusing in the least.

"What am I right about," Angela chortled. "You and Booth?"

"No." Feeling chilled despite the oppressive temperature inside the car, Brennan shivered slightly. Then she twisted her palms together as if to check that her sense of touch was still present. "You said the bones speak to me. That's not true, of course. It's impossible for bones to ... utter words. They don't speak to me, Angela. They don't _say_ anything."

"Wait, I thought you said I was right."

"They don't say anything, but sometimes, I think I hear something."

The stunned silence was finally broken by a murmured, "Wow."

Brennan retreated then, shaking it off because it was irrational, it defied empirical sense and how could she explain anything so ... impossible. "I guess I have an over active imagination."

"Oh no you don't! Don't you dare tease me with something like that and then try to back out."

"I'm not."

"You just finally admitted that you sense something that you can't explain."

Miserably, Brennan shifted and interested herself in the scrub and cacti passing rapidly out her window. A trio of buzzards circled high in the sky ahead, signaling the demise of some hapless creature along the side of the road. "It's intuition," Brennan argued. And at a near whisper, she confessed what had changed. "And I'm losing it."

Growing concerned and grateful for the distraction away from worry over Kirk, Angela traded rapid glances between the road and Brennan. "You can't really lose intuition."

"Sometimes a word comes into my mind," Brennan explained. "It must be me subconsciously taking in all the evidence and putting it together with previous experience. In the back of my mind it all gets put together. But lately, it doesn't seem to be happening. I don't know why."

"Maybe it is happening but you're just not as aware."

"Maybe." She didn't sound convinced.

~Q~

Once they arrived at the tiny Sheriff's office, Angela led the way in. This one was even smaller than the office in Aurora, Washington, Brennan noted, and the people much less friendly. She felt eyes prickling against her back as she and Angela waited for the Sheriff, Ben Dawes, to finish a phone call. Angela introduced Brennan and tried to get him to reveal the skull to her during pauses in his phone conversation, while he resisted and waved off her attempts.

Finally hanging up, and clearly frustrated by a multitude of problems involving lost citizens, uncooperative police agencies and unwelcome strangers, he met Angela's eyes. "They've gotta be running low on water."

It was past five days, Brennan thought. More than likely they were already out of water.

"I don't give them more than a couple of days," the sheriff added, and Brennan suspected he was softening the reality for Angela.

The stress cracked Angela's request, fracturing her words. "Ben, if you could just show Dr. Brennan the skull."

Brennan tried being helpful by getting herself out of his way. "Or, point me toward the morgue."

Ben's suspicious eyes penetrated into hers, distrustful and assessing. Grudgingly he decided to cooperate because Angela was asking and seemed to have confidence in the tall woman she'd brought with her. He turned abruptly to grab a metal box from the floor and slapped it onto his desk. A second later, the lid was open and he lifted a gallon-size plastic Ziploc bag aloft.

"Welcome to the Merville County morgue," he snapped, plopping the bag in front of Brennan.

Her eyes widened more at the rudeness than at the lack of proper facilities. She'd seen worse. The sheriff watched and waited, expecting a reaction, but aside from a reassuring flicker of a glance towards Angela, Brennan gave him nothing further to censure.

And grudgingly, he approved of that.

Quickly she yanked on gloves and set to work easing Angela's fears. The skull was dried out, almost completely stripped of flesh. What little remained was desiccated and tattered like paper streamers. "Prominent brow ridge indicates victim is male. Do you mind?" She glanced back at the sheriff and gestured toward a paper plate containing the leftovers of a stale blueberry muffin.

"Be my guest," he offered, lifting the plate towards her.

Angela shook her head. "Oh, no. She wants the plate, Ben. Not the muffin."

Shrugging, he tossed the muffin and handed over the plate.

Brennan took the plate and flipped it, using it as a platform to hold the skull. With her hands free, she bent down eye-to-orbit , running her fingertips rapidly over the curves. She listened. She waited, and all she felt was a rough buzzing like distant bees.

Her eyes still worked and she reported what she saw, what she knew it meant. The tall, narrow frontal bone was an obvious racial marker. "Cranial shape and nasal features suggest Caucasian."

"Died in the last several days," Angela said, knowing Brennan would correct her if she was wrong. After more than a year working with remains, Angela had picked up a few skills of her own.

"Critters been at it pretty good," Ben agreed. Food went fast in the desert.

Brennan picked up the skull again and flipped it, her assessment running on high speed. There were many things a skull could tell her even when it was silent. Fingertips floated over the suture lines, notched in jagged seams that were fully integrated and blending together. "The pattern of basilar suture fusion puts age 30-35."

Angela shook her head, insisting, "Well, it doesn't look like Kirk." Because she didn't want it to.

Ben sighed. "It doesn't look like anyone, Angie."

Brennan ignored them, working faster and more intensely than she ever had before. Her eyes flashed like lightening over the entire surface, flickering fast over sutures and fossae, looking for clues to identity and fate. Seeing some dark material still caught deep within the orbits, Brennan grabbed a forceps and scraped a sample out. She brought it to her nose, depending on all of her remaining senses to give her clues.

"Putrecine." A distinct scent of decomposition, indicating death had occurred within less than a few days. "Early stages of decomp."

"Cause of death?" Angela shifted weight, anxious enough to ignore the yuk factor of Brennan having deliberately inhaled the putrid stench of decay.

Brennan had already moved on to a small magnifying glass that she passed carefully over the surface. For all the attention she gave either her friend or the sheriff, she might as well be alone. Everything she had in terms of concentration was narrowed onto the bones, onto listening. Dimly scuffed sounds began to whisper deeply under her consciousness, barely discernible as anything other than white noise. Static from an untuned radio.

_'We're out past where Jesus lost his sandals,'_ Angela had said earlier, too far away for radio signals. Brennan felt mounting frustration as her own distance interfered and deprived her friend of information she needed. She drew a calming breath and focused her energy again, letting her mind rest while her eyes just drifted in hope they would snag on the smallest clue.

Ben said quietly, "A man gets caught unawares out in the desert, he could be dead in a few hours."

_Make a sound_, Brennan begged silently, hating the disconnection and starting to get uneasy. _Tell me something_. A sharper spike of noise squawked as she turned down to the occipital and the foramen magnum. Her relief to finally have something turned immediately to dismay. "Uh oh," she murmured, knowing she'd found it.

"What?" Angela.

"Base of the skull, here? Detached from the spinal cord." She held the magnifier close over the scuffed edges. "See these little bevel marks? Perimortem contact gunshot."

She looked up at the sheriff. "It wasn't the desert who caught this man unawares, it was someone with a gun."

He'd been executed, shot cleanly through the place where the spine enters the brain. Instant death.

"Is it Kirk?" It was Angela who asked, her usually soft sepia eyes now tight with anger, denial, desperation.

Brennan turned the skull carefully back to view its face. Letting her imagination go, letting her knowledge of anatomy flow, she attempted to visualize a face. A faint impression of a high brow and powerful chin was all she could muster. Desperately, she looked to Angela and knew, knew without a doubt who Angela thought she saw. But she couldn't prove it, and Angela was holding it hostage as a last grasp at hope.

"I can't be certain," Brennan hedged. "I need the Angelator." The unspoken remainder was, she needed Angela herself.

"So it's not him," Angela decided.

"I didn't say that. It could be. The evidence fits and the skull's characteristics are congruent."

Angela shook her head. "You're not sure and you're all about being sure."

Brennan bit her lip, gazing at the skull with something akin to longing. "If I could take this back to the Jeffersonian..."

"I'm afraid that isn't going to happen," Sheriff Dawes interrupted. "We may be a small community but this is our business. You aren't a cop. The skull stays right here."

"But I have resources there that could—"

He was shaking his head. "Not going to happen."

~Q~

They reached Angela's cabin at dusk, and the argument had gone on for the last hour. "You can't say that it's Kirk."

"I know," Brennan admitted sadly, finally giving in to the stalemate.

For Angela, the last reserves of hope were threatening to slip away because Brennan looked sad, and hesitant and despairing.

Their eyes met in shared grief over things lost, prices paid. "You want some tea?"

Brennan sheepishly answered, "I'd rather have a beer." Her head ached and maybe beer would take it away, replace it with fuzziness and eventual oblivion.

While Angela went into the kitchen, Brennan occupied herself with a stack of photos on a table near the door. "This woman modeling in these pictures. Is this Dhani?"

"Yeah. Dhani Weber. She's Kirk's guide in the desert."

"She's beautiful," Brennan observed thoughtfully. High cheek bones framed softly angled eyes, while a well-shaped mandible upheld a wisp of a smile. She seemed to be lost in thought as she gazed at the horizon.

"Dani's lived here her whole life," Angela continued. "You know, Ben says that she knows the desert better than anybody. Look, there's no way that she gets lost, or she runs out of water. There's just no way."

So that skull was Kirk. Logically, it was. Angela had called because she'd seen it immediately. Brennan reached out to touch Angela and the artist withdrew sharply. "No."

Brennan held back, cautious. "What?"

"Brennan, if you hug me and you be all caring, it's because you think Kirk is dead … or because he was sleeping with Dhani."

It _was_ Kirk, he was dead, but Angela refused to accept it. Brennan knew that she could not prove it alone, and that was how she also knew Angela's pain could not be lessened. Angela was fighting hard to keep the lid on the box, to keep her cat's fate ambiguous for as long as possible. The desolate denial would go on, until Kirk came back (which wasn't going to happen) or Brennan could get help from Booth, Hodgins and Zack, and only then would the agonizing proof force open the box.

For now, the only thing she could do was to remind Angela that she understood. "No, it's because … I'm sorry that my friend is upset because someone she loves is missing."

They'd been over this before, a few months back. _"Only you know what it's like,"_ Angela had insisted. Only Brennan knew how it felt to wait and worry and to know nothing as each day passed and the window for hope got narrower, darker. Angela sighed in resignation. "All right. I can buy that."

The embrace felt awkward, mostly because Angela refused to let herself embrace the sympathy it contained. She pulled back, needing distance. "If you don't mind, I'm just gonna go to bed."

"Good night," Brennan agreed. The first swig of beer was followed by two more, each one numbing her a little more. Each one bringing oblivion a little closer. Brennan rarely drank to self-medicate, but the upside of intoxication was that it dulled pain and provided a nice little serenade of tinnitus. Drowning out the aching quiet, that's what she needed.

She paced relentlessly for about five more swallows before the liquid balm bolstered her enough to make the first phone call. By the time she made the second, she'd downed half the bottle. Angela had left the room less than ten minutes ago.

He answered on the second ring. "Booth."

"How far are you from Dulles?" she asked point blank.

He frowned at the strange query. "As far as your office is from Dulles."

She heard papers shuffling in the background, putting that together with what he'd just said. "Why are you in my office?"

"I need your findings on the Richmond case. Listen, Zack? He won't tell me where they are unless you give him permission."

Brennan launched into the purpose of her call straight away, before he could sidetrack her and waste so much time that he missed it. "There's a 9:15 flight to Denver, then there's an 11:35 flight to Santa Fe. You'll have to run to make the connection."

He snorted, not even caring to know what the hell she was talking about. He was not going to freaking New Mexico tonight, or tomorrow, or next week. Never. "Forget it."

"Booth…" The pitch of her voice changed, softened. He heard it and froze, recognizing the game had changed in the last ten seconds and how had she managed that? "Please."

A second passed silently while Brennan drew a breath to explain. "Angela's boyfriend is missing, maybe dead." No, he _was_ dead, she just couldn't prove it. The loss struck her hard, making her fingers curl tightly around the link between her and the help she now needed. She couldn't do it alone anymore. "It took all of my charm—"

Retreating from the burden she was asking him to share, Booth interrupted her with a wry laugh. "Oh, all your charm. Oh, boy." This meant there was a pissed off sheriff in some Podunk town to contend with. And she wanted, what, for him to come fight her battle for her? No.

"…Just to get the sheriff to let me _look_ at the skull." She continued without pause, hoping he would listen. "When I asked him to let me send the skull to the Jeffersonian, he told me I am not a cop, and that I don't have any jurisdiction."

It came over the wires as pain, rippling frustration, hurt, powerlessness, fear; a plea he could not ignore and yet, his own hands were bound by borders and jurisdictional dogfights. Booth scratched at his scalp in acute distress, knowing he had little choice other than an official 'no.'

"Which is true," he reminded her sharply. Officially, the FBI did not get involved in small town missing persons cases. But it was about Angela, and someone missing, and Brennan was on the edge. He could hear it. Damn it. Damn. Angry, frustrated himself, he spit out the question. "Okay, what? What do you want me to do?"

Her fingers squeezed the beer bottle tighter, lifting soothing fumes of beer to slake the building anger. "I want you to get _Federal_ on his ass!"

When had she ever spoken that way? Booth felt a jolt of shock, then a larger surge of pride because Temperance Brennan was _asking_ him to be her white knight. First time for everything, right? He wasn't going to say no.

When he found the small cabin at 8 in the morning, bearing coffee and donuts, Brennan scowled at his brusque entrance but behind the imperious demand that he wait outside for her to get dressed—which he refused—Brennan's surprised first words upon seeing him were more than enough reward.

"Booth! You came."

She had asked for his help; of course he would come.

~Q~

The search for Kirk ended with a DNA test on the skull Sheriff Dawes was finally forced to send to the Jeffersonian. That magic had come courtesy of Booth making phone calls from DC before he left to catch his hastily arranged flight. Eventually, using a trail of clues, Brennan, Booth, Angela and Dawes found the last known location where Kirk had photographed Dhani. On the last day where hope might still be considered reasonable, (just as it verged on the horizon between wild and insane), they stood in a group at the base of the outcropping of boulders. Booth, the former Army Ranger, suggested everyone fan out to the four points of the compass in a search for tracks or clues.

Angela followed instinct when she selected a direction. Closing her eyes, feeling the desert press around her, she stood and waited, and _felt_. A breeze skiffed over her skin, lifted tendrils of her hair like delicate fingers passing through. Turning slowly back the way she'd come, to the escarpment where Dhani had posed, she saw the ghostly outline of Dhani Weber floating gracefully towards her, watching her, and striding silently toward a rise covered in scree and scrub. Dhani paused and turned back, black eyes striking Angela like obsidian as she seemed to urge the artist to follow her.

Hesitation and a smattering of Brennan-like doubt held Angela still. She closed her eyes again as Dhani vanished, disbelieving, but then Brennan herself suddenly materialized at her side.

"You all right?" she asked with concern.

Angela's eyes snapped open and she exhaled slowly. Looking into Brennan's worried grey eyes, Angela wondered if they trusted each other enough. Fighting back tears, and a bit of fear as well, she lifted her arm and pointed the way Dhani had gone. "Dhani went that way."

And Dr Temperance Brennan, skeptic, empiricist to the bitter end, followed the arrow of index finger back to its origin, to Angela, and nodded. "Okay."

Letting out a sigh, the artist turned to her friend, relieved and amazed. "You're not going to question me about this?"

"No." Brennan breathed out slowly, breathed in slowly while she considered all of the evidence carefully. "I trust you."

It didn't sound right, such serenity and acceptance from a woman who demanded facts for everything she believed. "I basically pointed out a random direction," Angela reminded the scientist.

Glancing around herself, and back to the artist, she explained their similarity. "If bones can speak to me, maybe the desert can speak to you. That's what you said earlier, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Angela agreed, recalling their conversation from earlier.

Ever pragmatic, Brennan shrugged. "Then we can argue about this later. For now, let's just go get your friend Dhani."

~Q~

And they did argue about it later, after Dhani was safely recovered and rushed to a hospital. After Angela cried over Kirk's death and permanently packed up her life in the desert. As they were preparing to leave the cottage the following morning, Brennan explained what she perceived to be intuition. "Obviously you subconsciously sifted through the rational facts of the case and processed the most likely scenario."

Like Brennan did with bones? Angela lifted an amused brow, and responded with her own brand of skepticism. "I'm sure that's it. It's the only rational explanation."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Angela basically had a psychic vision and Brennan went with it. Where did that rational empiricist go...?

Time for a bit of bad news.

It's the last week before finals. I may have some difficulty getting chapter 19 finished by Friday (the 15th), but hopefully it will go up before Sunday (the 17th). The only good thing about finals is my last all-day-Saturday lab is tomorrow. Yay! This weekend is crazy busy with final projects, so it may be Sunday or Monday before I can reply to reviews. I promise you will hear from me eventually, though.

Thank you to all the readers, to those who follow and favorite, and especially thank you to those who give the gift of reviews. I appreciate them more than I can say.


	19. The Noise in her Head

Author's Note: Ah, dear readers. It's the height of 'hell week' just before finals and the timing has been interesting. (What makes timing interesting is that Brennan's angst is dovetailing with my own end-of-term sufferings. Behold our mutual agony.)

* * *

~Q~

~The Noise in her Head~

~Q~

**Where should this music be? i' the air or the earth?**  
** It sounds no more: and sure, it waits upon**  
** Some god o' the island. Sitting on a bank,**  
** Weeping again the king my father's wreck,**  
** This music crept by me upon the waters,**  
** Allaying both their fury and my passion**  
** With its sweet air: thence I have follow'd it,**  
** Or it hath drawn me rather. But 'tis gone.**  
** No, it begins again.**

_The Tempest, Act I, Scene 2, Lines 452-460_

~Q~

**May 2006**

When bold tangerine sunlight started spilling into her apartment, she took a last, fortifying gulp of coffee because it was time to finish dressing and head out to work. The time would be edging past six-thirty by the time she left and traffic would soon get crazy.

Etta James crooned softly from the stereo that life was like a song (since he came along) as Brennan rifled through her earrings. Every pair had a story and a place attached, some more compelling than others. Her fingers brushed over a rounded metal disk, familiar, and she pinched the disk between them, lifting out her mother's earring. This one had the longest story, more than one place and more than one time. Studying it, she traced the circular swell in the center while her eyes cast down for its mate. Booth flashed in her mind, mated to the earrings now that he'd risked his career and even his freedom to restore the missing one to her.

She felt her pulse throb a little harder as it often did lately when thinking of her partner. Excitement mingled with peace, agitation mixed with surety, cocky twirled around sweet; everything contradicted with itself where he was concerned. A strange sensation of movement rippled low in her belly, prompting Brennan to renew her vow to seek out the physiological explanation for 'butterflies in the stomach.' Angela had described it thus to her once, and she could not deny that the roiling tumble did indeed resemble the brush of soft wings. What caused that feeling? (Aside from Booth himself, that is.)

Slipping the earrings into her lobes on a whim, Brennan reached for a suitably similar necklace and rushed out of her room. She'd wasted enough time while Etta sighed, _"You smile, oh, and then the spell was cast."_

Booth's smile could definitely cast spells. Grabbing her bag and keys, Brennan sighed herself, wondering what was wrong with her.

~Q~

"You're wearing your mother's earrings."

Her heart stumbled and raced again as Brennan looked up in surprise. He'd noticed, that fast? She succeeded in resisting the tug of her orbicularis oris muscle, fighting off the urge to smile, but Booth won the contest to keep her gaze suspended. Their eyes held so long she finally blushed a little and looked away. "They're my favorite." She'd told him that already, in New Orleans.

"They look pretty against your hair."

That did not sound like something partners said to each other. Brennan shook her head, feeling again the currents that had changed them in the last few weeks, since he'd charged down to New Orleans and tenderly tilted her chin to look at her bruises. (And she could close her eyes and see again the concern radiating out from under his closely drawn brows, know again the calming sense of safety just the thought of him brought forth.)

Then the very foundation of them had shifted since he sat with her at Arlington and confessed to her about being a sniper. (The warm sun had heated their backs while brilliant white light bounced off the standing headstones. He'd stumbled over the event he tried to describe, his guilt and grief mixed into a cocktail of shame. She could still feel his warm and heavy hand covering hers, his thumb tracing an arc over her metacarpals. She could still hear the halting words, hear how the tears she could see in his eyes had thickened his voice, see his broad shoulders tremble under the burden.)

Though she hadn't really known what to do that afternoon in a graveyard, instinct had touched her hand to his arm and stilled her voice. Afterwards, he'd looked into her with blazing gratitude and explained he'd never told anyone about it, and he would never tell anyone else. Ever. That was how the space between them vanished and ever since, they touched each other with eyes and hearts as well as hands.

If she didn't already have all that as an example of all the things that were different, Booth gave her another one right then. Striding over to her coat tree, he snagged her blazer in one hand and her forearm in the other. "Come on, Bones, and bring the Patterson file."

"What? Where are we going?"

"Patterson file. Wong Fu's. And before you ask why, court date tomorrow."

Oh. Brennan turned to her inbox, pulling the folder out and feeling Booth start to draw her jacket over her commandeered arm. "Booth, I can dress myself," she protested.

"It's more fun if you let me do it," he countered.

Her startled expression made him smirk. "I'm putting clothes _on_ you, Bones. Not taking them off."

"I ... realize that," she stuttered, completely unnerved (and yes, she scolded herself, utterly excited, too) at the idea of him removing articles of clothing. Feeling his eyes on her, her pulse fluttering again, Brennan looked up and wondered how she'd ever managed to get any work done when Booth was around. Lately he pulled every particle of concentration out of her and kept it to himself. The only thing fair about this development was the fact that he seemed caught up in it, too. His hands never seemed to stop touching her and it never occurred to her to stop allowing it.

Booth turned her, drawing the jacket over her other shoulder while she slipped her other arm in. She felt his hands lifting her hair free, felt him smooth the cloth over her shoulders unnecessarily. Their eyes snagged again and time stood still (she was sure of it). Nothing moved, neither breathed, what was this?

This wasn't good (no matter how wonderful it felt!); they couldn't work around this much distraction. Could they?

Booth broke the moment by gently setting her earring swaying. "It was worth it."

For once, she didn't have to ask what he meant.

~Q~

The following morning, Booth actually did take her clothing off.

Brennan was bent over her desk, pawing frantically through the chaos her own search had wrought upon it while Dr. Goodman advised her to forget the original notes and just go with him to the Archeology wing so she could determine if an authentication was Syrian, Egyptian or Hittite. That was the moment Booth hustled in and started tugging her lab coat right off her and she was nearly too distracted to notice.

"I can't find my original notes!"

"There's a copy in the file," Booth reminded her as the lab coat left her completely. A second later he had her blazer in hand.

Brennan shook her head, still searching. "The last time I read from copies, the defense attorney said I was winging it."

"It was a ploy, it failed. Let's go." He palmed her bare arms, pulling her around and propelling her out of her own office with a physicality that would have been unthinkable just weeks ago. She held her arms back while he helped her slip the jacket on in wordless cooperation that seemed choreographed. His hands found their familiar locations on her back and shoulder as Booth navigated Brennan through a gantlet of clamoring squints.

They successfully dodged Hodgins, Angela, even Goodman, but...

"Dr. Brennan!" Zack was calling.

Despite Booth's protest, Brennan veered off course to join her student because Zack's education was her responsibility. "What's up?"

"Buttercup. If you sign off on these tissue markers, Angela can finish the facial reconstruction." He brought her to the skull he'd been working on while they exchanged queries about the odd little idiom, 'what's up, buttercup.' With a broad gesture, he invited her to take in his work. "This ... is the latest woman from Limbo."

Brennan bent closer, looking down into the skull of an adult female, probably 30's to 40's. She had a large, oval nasal opening and rounded orbits with a slender supraorbital margin. A long and slender nasal bone seemed distinctive and familiar, the only feature that made the skull anything other than unremarkable. Brennan noted the skull appeared free of injury and the tissues were marked too deep along the cheeks and jaw line, but otherwise Angela should run the facial reconstruction program.

Booth was still trying valiantly to drag her out of the Jeffersonian while Dr. Goodman hovered and implored her to confirm a Hittite for Archeology. That had been her job once, she recalled dimly, looking at ancient bodies culled from antiquity; but she didn't have time for that today. It was an ancient find anyway, she reasoned. Plenty of time had already passed - what was a few hours more...?

With a last, thoughtful glance at Zack's skull, Brennan allowed Booth to shepherd her away.

They cleared the lab and Brennan's mind was drifting back to the present and her impending testimony when they were halted by by an unexpected visit from David Simmons of the now infamous Internet dating disaster. He'd read her manuscript he declared, and returned it to her with approval. Though their attempt at romance had gone nowhere, they'd struck up enough of a friendship for her to trust his judgement on whether her book was ready to go to the publisher.

Booth made no effort to conceal his jealousy over this development. "Am I in it?"

"No," Brennan denied quickly.

"Definitely," David smirked.

Brennan felt her cheeks burning. During the last few weeks she'd edited the story, bringing the sexual tension between her Kathy and Andy characters to the very edge of consummation. Smoke and steam hissed off the pages by the middle of the novel and at the end, they combusted and the paper threatened to ignite under the reader's hand. She'd had plenty of inspiration in the last weeks.

"We have to get to court," Brennan muttered with relief.

Booth gladly tried to steer her away but everything derailed because David reminded her that a previous lawyer had questioned the authenticity of her recall when she'd read from photocopies of her case notes. So it was true, Brennan decided: she really did need the originals, just as she'd been insisting all morning long. "Told you, Booth!"

As his exhortation that they didn't have time tapered into a resigned promise to wait for her in the car, Brennan dashed back into the lab. Her path circled around the platform and past Angela's office but as she rushed by she caught a glimpse of a face rotating in the holographic projector that froze her solid. Almost instantly Brennan halted, unable to move and she stared, disbelieving, for a full five seconds. She didn't move or even breathe until Goodman noted her shock and asked if something was wrong. His concern melted her enough to charge forward once more, driven by panic sublimated into anger.

It had to be a joke. Grasping the nuances of jokes, understanding the allure of pranks, for example, often eluded her. So, this was a gag, the sort of trickery Hodgins and Zack might conspire together.

"What's this," she demanded, noting Angela was literally behind it (not Hodgins) but with the way those two had begun flirting lately anything was possible.

Angela was focused on her pad and stylus, not yet in tune with Brennan's emerging fury. She didn't look up, just mumbled out the answer. "Zack's Jane Doe from Limbo. He said that you okayed the tissue markers."

"No! That can't be right." If not a joke, then what, something she'd missed? Shaking her head, trying to picture the skull she'd just looked at, Brennan felt a wave of hysteria rising up to swallow her. What was this, that she would look directly at it and see nothing. _I just looked at it! I would have seen it. I should have…._ She swallowed terror, and lashed out.

"That can't possibly be right. You did it _wrong_. It's a mistake, Angela!"

Startled at Brennan's unexpected meltdown, Angela was a little bit slow in reacting. By the time she managed to shout, "All right, fine. Sweetie, I'll turn it off!" Brennan had already raced out of her office.

It wasn't a joke or a mistake, she realized with a shot of nausea and horror. She was making rash judgements without the benefit of evidence, acting on impulses. None of it was a mistake, except for whatever bizarre turn of events that had stopped her from seeing it immediately; followed by acting irrationally in the face of the unexpected.

"Zack! The artifact bag from your Jane Doe. Do you have it?" Brennan rushed the platform at a run, setting off alarms and alarming her intern as she snatched the incipiently proffered folder out of his hands.

"Yes, uh, I also have three…" she was already leaving the platform so he increased his volume "…three bags of soil samples from where the remains were buried." Wincing, he put his fingers to his ears while security reported Brennan had triggered the alarms. They were too startled at her bizarre behavior to act quickly in shutting the alarms off.

The chirping of alarms provided the soundtrack that followed Brennan into her office, where she plowed everything off her work area and dumped the contents of the artifacts folder onto the surface. The few items tumbled onto the glass with a clatter, shrouded in plastic evidence bags. A large, glass cat's eye marble and a decaying belt with a tarnished silver buckle caught her eye. The buckle featured a curving dolphin, edged in ancient mud and still attached to a decaying leather belt. Brennan stared at it, touched it cautiously through the plastic shroud.

She'd borrowed this belt. She'd worn it. The alarms finally cut off, leaving behind a roar of shifting tides, the whump of waves hitting sand and a riptide that pulled her off her feet.

Her mother's face flashed in her eyes.

Indeterminate time passed while she stared. Sensing Booth at the door, Brennan spoke out of the haze surrounding her, the sound of her own voice nearly lost under the gurgle of churning water and scouring sand. "I have to miss court."

"I know," he answered softly.

~Q~

Angela guided her into the car and supervised buckling the seat belt, prompting a halfhearted protest. "I'm not a child."

Touching Brennan's head gently, Angela sighed. "You just lost your mother today. Let me mother you for a minute."

She turned rain-filled eyes away, gazing into the horizon while Angela hopped into the driver's seat. The engine hummed, a radio tune shifting to commercial in the instant before Angela turned it down.

"No, leave it," Brennan instructed softly. She wanted meaningful sound, anything to quiet the constant static that had replaced the void. After the weeks of silence that she had finally begun to accept, the crackling return of static was jarring and painful, almost unwelcome.

Shrugging, Angela turned the volume up, letting the manic call to a local mattress outlet fill up the car.

Brennan let her weary skull drop back against the seat with eyes closed, and that made her fall prey to wavering images of her mother's face.

"Bren, do you still think I made a mistake?"

"No," she answered thickly. "I'm the one who made a mistake."

They were circling upwards now, heading for the exit from their underground parking structure. "What mistake?"

Exiting the Jeffersonian onto an arterial clogged with morning traffic, Angela turned her attention to driving out of the mess of late spring DC tourism coupled with straggling commuters. How was it still only eight in the morning?

Brennan lifted her head to stare at the dash clock in disbelief. Not even an hour at work and so much had changed. "I didn't see her," she answered at last, still nearly dazed with shock. "I looked right at her, Angela. Right at my own mother's skull, and I didn't see her."

Shaking her head in denial, Angela tried to justify the unforgivable lapse. "You weren't expecting to."

"That didn't stop me from seeing Cleo." Brennan felt a trickle of pain tease her cheek. Dashing it away, she closed her weeping eyes and acknowledged what she'd begun to suspect a few weeks ago. "First I couldn't hear them anymore; now I can't see them either."

"Bren..."

"Why didn't I see her?"

And why had the noise returned now?

"We'll figure it out, okay?"

~Q~

For a while, she tried sleeping but every time she drifted off she was swamped by dreams of happier times. When late afternoon rolled around, she called Angela and found nothing had happened because Booth had still been needed at the courthouse. Brennan rummaged through her closet and pulled a small shoebox out from the back. This box had followed her through several foster homes, a college dormitory and Michael Stires's house.

She spent the rest of the night reliving the past and when someone finally knocked on her door, she was startled to see the hour had grown very late. Booth stood on the other side, tempting her with Szechuan and fried rice direct from Sid. He promised her that the disappearance of her parents would finally be investigated and she knew, without him saying it, that Booth himself was going to be the one who pressed for answers.

The thought filled her with comfort, even a sort of peace, despite the pain of finally _knowing_ her mother was dead.

Returning to work the next day, Brennan kept herself busy with paperwork and finally confirming Goodman's Hittite. When Booth arrived and demanded 'the room,' he hesitated and tried to break the confusing news to her gently: Christine and Matthew Brennan didn't exist before 1978. He'd found a birth certificate for a Matthew Brennan who was born and died in 1948. Her parents were living under assumed identities since she was two years old.

After he left it seemed the roar inside her cranium had resumed like an incoming tide. As she approached her mother's skull finally, now, her mother's face emerged. Tracing a finger tenderly over the curves of bone, she saw it. This was her mother. These were the features she should have seen yesterday: the high forehead, the narrow jaw, the long and slender nose that Brennan herself had inherited (she had her father's strong, square jaw). Her mother's indigo eyes finally blinked back at her with a confusion that mirrored her own.

Reluctantly, Hodgins called her attention. "Dr. Brennan?"

"Yes, um…" She stood, awkwardly, because he'd caught her touching the skull and she knew that wasn't quite permitted under the circumstances. "Did you find something in the soil?"

"Yeah. Uh, this was in the soil samples alongside your mother's remains." He flipped on the monitor and stepped aside to let her see what he'd found earlier.

Brennan frowned, studying the image intently. "A movie ticket?"

Angela supplied the information that was going to hurt. "Rialto Theater, nine pm showing of The Fugitive. September 22nd, 1993."

Brennan glanced from the date delineated on the monitor to Angela, then back to her soils expert. "Well, how'd it get there?"

Kindly, Hodgins explained what was painfully obvious. "Either your mother had it in her possession when she was buried or, someone buried it with her."

Angela finished, "Either way, it … dates the burial."

"No." Brennan shook her head because what they were saying... "That's … that's impossible. My mother disappeared in 1991."

"Sweetie…"

Thinking fast, grabbing at any scenario that didn't mean her mother had deserted her, Brennan threw out Occam's Razor. Threw it and kicked it and stomped on it for good measure. "It's possible my mom was buried somewhere else for a year and a half, then moved."

"No," Hodgins insisted, still compassionate. The soil samples would have told him that. Christine Brennan had been buried once and only once, in Salisbury Pennsylvania. "That's not possible."

"Maybe it is," Angela interrupted, anguished over her friend's suffering. She gave Hodgins a pointed, pleading glance.

Holding it right back, Hodgins trusted his own judgment, knowing that to delay the truth would not be kind. Just get it over with, like ripping off the band-aid. "We decided to tell you the truth. And _this_ is the truth." Occam's Razor was a founding premise in science: all evidence being equal, the simplest explanation was the best explanation.

Her mother lived almost two years after the disappearance.

Pain exploded under her skin, sending shockwaves through her entire nervous system. Awash in the energy of pain, she turned blindly and returned to the skull, her mother's skull. Noise roared in her head like a screaming jet, so loud that nothing else registered. As she reached for it, her fingertips curving around the parietal bones, information poured into her at supersonic speed. She felt everything blazing through her mind, booming in her head. White hot static exploded and she flipped the skull, staring directly into the underside of the calvarium via the foramen magnum, the opening where the spinal column emerged.

"Are you all right?" Angela asked gently, inwardly noting Brennan had been asking her that only a few short weeks ago. How quickly things changed, then changed again.

Lost in the white noise, she seemed not to hear Angela. Her eyes fell over a splotch of staining marring the underside of the left parietal. Distantly, Brennan said, "I'm pretty sure I just found cause of death."

Then she raised her voice to call out. "Zack?" He came quickly, drawn by the urgency of her voice, and she showed him what the noise had revealed. "See the discoloration on the inside of the skull?"

Angela knew she wasn't going to get through to Brennan now. Recognizing the glazed eyes and pale skin for signs of possession, she decided she'd better wait a while, until the energy ran its course. She left Brennan in the company of her intern.

He took it from her gently, tilting it for a better look into the depths. "Left side, extending from the coronal suture, crossing the superior/inferior temporal lines to the squamosal suture. Subdural hematoma, a big one."

Across the lab, the doors slid open to admit Booth and a man she hadn't seen in over 15 years. Brennan froze again as another shock slammed into her.

"Dr. Brennan?" Zack prompted.

Her head erupted into unbearable crackling. It felt like an inner ear infection, the piercing pain plunging through the core of her eardrums and ripping through them until she could barely think. Brennan shook herself, attempting to function. "Probably fatal," she agreed hoarsely.

Zack pointed out, "there are no indications of a blow to the outer skull."

Russ Brennan was getting closer. Drawing a nearly panicked breath, fighting to be heard over the noise, she instructed rapidly, "Scan the outside of the skull. Look for morphological changes, microscopic remodeling."

Brennan shot up and away, striding towards Booth as if pursued by a nightmare. Her steely grey gaze held his pinioned, and she paused barely long enough to growl softly, "I don't want to talk to him." She had to take it on faith that he heard her, because she could barely hear herself.

"Bones…"

She was gone, fast as her legs would carry her because in the last two days she'd learned her mother was dead, and her parents were not who she'd thought they were. In the last three minutes she'd learned her mother had abandoned her, then been killed by an injury that typically came from a blow, and now she was forced to see the sibling who had also abandoned her.

Her head throbbed with bone-piercing noise, so much static she couldn't think. Shaking with the intensity, she didn't even know where to go. Out of here, out of this … this.

"Bones!"

His voice called to her, reaching her through the blizzard of aching noise. Trembling, she paused, turned, and felt the wild shrieking relent just a little as he trotted up to her. "My mother died of a subdural hematoma," she gasped, words expelled from the hurricane raging in her mind.

Looking into his calm eyes steadied her, enabled her to focus and finish. "Bleeding in the brain."

"You want to proceed rationally, correct?"

Brennan shuddered a little, feeling as if he'd thrown her a life preserver and turned down the volume all at once. Still, she could barely speak. "Chances are, the subdural hematoma was caused," she broke off again, drawing air, drawing strength from him, "by a blow to the head."

"Great," he encouraged her. "You got the _how_. Now, let's … let's get the _who_."

Swamped by the torrent, her glowing eyes held his as if begging for a direction.

"You just told me that your mother was murdered. Who better to help us, then your brother?"

"I can't." Swaying on her feet, she felt Booth's strong hand grasp her arm and take her into her office. He had her sitting on her sofa a moment later, her head pressed down over her knees.

The sofa shifted beside her. "Bones, what's going on?"

"It hurts," she muttered, injecting anger to counter a competing urge to moan like a sick child. Somehow, in the recent absence of it all, she'd forgotten that under the noise she'd always had to endure pain as well. She'd forgotten how much it hurt.

"It always hurts when we lose someone," he offered gently.

"No," she mumbled, struggling to find a position that would relieve the furious rushing of blood under her temples. "My head hurts."

Maybe he shouldn't be surprised that she was being literal, that psychological pain would manifest itself physically in Brennan. Hearing the grind of suffering in her voice, Booth ran his hand over her back in a quick stroke of sympathy. "I'll go see if Angela has some aspirin or something. Be right back."

He found the artist a few feet away from Brennan's office, eyeing Russ Brennan suspiciously. "Did something happen, Angela?"

Angela tugged him away from the door so she could tell him without Brennan overhearing. "Hodgins found a movie ticket to The Fugitive." When that failed to mean anything, she added, "a movie that came out in 1993. It means Christine Brennan lived nearly two years after she disappeared."

Through the window, he saw Brennan lifting her head, her pale cheeks streaked with tears now that she was alone. "Her mother abandoned her?" Christine Brennan had been lovingly buried with personal items in an unmarked grave at the edge of a graveyard, strongly suggesting Brennan's father had been the one who had laid her to rest. Glancing back up at Russ, Booth saw a young man who'd been hurt just as badly as his younger sister. "Their parents just ... _left_ them."

But if Christine was dead, where was Matthew? And why had they left their children behind? He shook his head, knowing those questions had to wait. For now, a more urgent one required his attention. "You got anything for a headache?"

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Has anyone else wondered how she could 'see' Cleo long before Angela brought her face to life in the Angelator, yet Brennan looked directly at her own mother and didn't see a thing...? Gotta love those niggling little questions.

This chapter is one that I have had planned right from the beginning and everything you've read so far was preparation for this moment and the partial resolution that follows next. Are you ready?


	20. Trading Names - End Part 1

Author's Note: Either this chapter was going to be late, or it was going to be short. Usually I write two or three chapters ahead so I have a long cushion of time (for editing and especially for contingencies) but I've had to use up my reserve chapters to get through finals. Tuesday night arrived and I had nothing but notes for this chapter. Yikes!

So a compromise is what I'm offering today. I'm posting what feels to me like not quite a whole chapter on time plus this excuse ... er, apology. And in return I'll be offering you readers a choice at the end. :0)

*** Note,** as of Sunday the 24th, I've edited this and it's much more finished than it was when it first posted on Friday the 22nd.

* * *

~Q~

~Trading Names~

~Q~

**What's in a name? That which we call a rose**  
**By any other name would smell as sweet.**

**By a name **  
**I know not how to tell thee who I am. **  
**My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself, **  
**Because it is an enemy to thee.**

_Romeo and Juliet, Act II, Scene 2, lines 45-46; 57-60_

~Q~

Fury could not even begin to describe what she was feeling. Rage and agony and grief on a scale that was deafening, because not one thing in her life was real. Nothing.

"What is my real name, Russ?" She'd stood in the brilliant light of day, lost in the enormity of the FBI's forensic garage, lost to herself, and glared at her brother. Her criminal brother whom she'd thought an aberration, and now she understood that _she_ was the aberration. She'd come from a family of criminals. Booth knew, his finger pointed to the word she'd demanded but she cut his effort off. "No! I want _him_ to tell me!"

Joy.

That was her name, but what she felt was something closer to hatred.

She turned, unable to cope with anything and tried not to cry in front of him. Not in front of Russ. _No, wait_, her strangled brain taunted. _You've got his name wrong. He's Kyle_.

The return to the Jeffersonain happened in a blur of noise, sunlight flashing off cars, people bumbling past who had no idea how much pain a person could contain. Walking the entire distance did nothing to quiet the disorder that only seemed to grow and stretch out its snagging fingers to tear down her entire existence. She entered the cooler, dimmer lab and the first rending slash came from Angela. "Brennan?"

_That's not me._ In an old cartoon (classic, post World War 2 era) a cat had chased a mouse into a factory and in the fray, they'd knocked over a tower of cans that buried the cat. Angela's voice struck her through the din and knocked the bottom row away. Just that one word plowed under the entire structure when Brennan realized she didn't have a name that was hers. Her parents gave her names and took them away, gave her a home and took that away, too. Nothing was hers. It was all falling down in an avalanche.

"Sweetie, what's happened?" Angela's concerned face swam into focus and Brennan latched onto the term of endearment with desperation. Angela called her Sweetie sometimes. She'd always sort of rolled her eyes at the endearment before, never appreciated it. She would have to share it with Hodgins and Zack but at least she could be sure Angela wouldn't take it back.

They were in Angela's office now, dragged there she didn't know quite how or when. Angela was speaking to her, trying to get her attention. "Brennan, you're scaring me here."

"That's not my name." She started crying. Not the hard, heavy sobs of grief nor the crooning weep of sorrow. Not the stifled choking gusts of anger. These tears just leaked silently, squeezed out by the compression of an entire world collapsing and burying her under its crushing weight.

What happened? Where's Booth? Where's Russ? Why did Brennan look so destroyed? How did she get here? How much worse is this going to get? Questions pelted Angela like poisoned darts because she couldn't ask them. Brennan was looking so shell-shocked she knew one more question would be unbearable. For now, she just gathered her friend into an embrace and let the tears run.

~Q~

"Here, Sweetie, drink this."

A cup of steaming tea appeared beside her where she had curled into a ball on Angela's couch. The scent of honey-sweet flowers wafted towards her, telling her it was Angela's secret stash of golden Jasmine. _"The taste of beauty,"_ Angela had called it once.

The nameless woman unfurled herself, acknowledging she felt like a dried-up husk with a throbbing head and burning eyes. Was it possible to cry oneself into dust? If so she was half way there. She drank the flowered tea, felt perfume coat her tongue and sweeten her mouth and the constriction in her throat eased a little. "Thanks," she whispered gratefully.

Angela waited for the tea's magical properties to work and for her own intuitive mind to find the right way to ask Brennan what she'd meant. Brennan had merely looked dazed when she'd entered the lab, but hearing her name was what had crushed her. Before she could find the proper approach, her cell phone buzzed. Glancing surreptitiously at the screen, she felt relief for this particular reprieve. "Excuse me for a minute, I've gotta take this."

Outside, she lifted the phone to her ear and hissed, "What's going on?"

"Angela? Is Bones there?"

He sounded nervous, worried. Angela walked towards the loft, taking the stairs rapidly to put space between herself and Brennan's sensitive hearing. She looked out of it, but you just never knew with her. "She's here but she's a mess, Booth."

"Oh, thank God," he sighed. "I couldn't find her. She's not answering her phone."

"I don't think she heard it," Angela replied honestly. "What happened? Where are you?"

"I'm still at the FBI, with Russ Brennan."

"Her brother." Russ shows up and Tempe falls apart. Feeling a black fury winding around her, Angela started looking for the source of Brennan's pain. "Did he do something to her?"

A sigh. "Not really. He's been lying to her, but it's not really his fault."

"What? That doesn't make any sense."

Booth didn't sugar coat anything, perhaps because the depth of it had shocked even him. "It all starts with their parents. All the lies, and all this misery. They were living under assumed names since she was two. Before that, they were bank robbers."

"Oh my God," Angela moaned. No wonder Bren had completely buckled, she was honest and forthright (really, too much so) and to learn that her family was not must be earthshaking. Crushing.

"Russ knew that Temperance Brennan wasn't her real name. He was seven when the switch happened. Is she okay?"

"No, of course she's not okay," she snapped. _Bank robbers?!_ A life built on lies? Who would be okay with that. Then she puffed out a breath of apology because she knew none of this was Booth's fault. "I'm sorry..."

He forgave her instantly, as if he knew exactly how much Angela yearned to search out and destroy the origin of so much pain. "It's okay. I don't think anyone is thinking clearly anymore."

Angela fell silent for a moment, sorting through what she knew (and didn't know) and decided on what she needed to ask. "Why are you at the FBI with Russ?"

"We've got her parents' car and we're going over everything, looking for evidence. It's going to take a while."

That was fine, she thought, more than fine. Brennan needed time to recover. It was one thing to fall apart in front of her best friend, but Angela knew Brennan would not want anyone else to see her this uncontained. Booth might be the only other exception, yet the fact was Brennan had left him without explanation and returned here, leaving Angela the currently designated containment expert. "I'll take care of her, Booth. You just do what you gotta do."

Once the call ended, Angela paused at the railing and gazed down into the lab. Brennan was the uncontested Queen of the Lab: this was her dominion, but it was also Brennan's domicile. If she brought the anthropologist up here to recognize where she fit in, would it help? How to handle this...? Thinking back to the way Brennan had reacted to her own name, Angela decided the primary problem was ownership.

Take her own name, Angela mused. Angela Pearly Gates ... and that other name that she absolutely _refused_ to acknowledge ... Montenegro. Her father had named her but Angela owned her names (and deliberately disowned the one she despised). It was the same for any of us, wasn't it? Booth, she recalled, hated Seeley. Until this morning Brennan had been less than thrilled with Temperance.

So, what's in a name, anyway? Shakespeare had it right all along. A rose by any other name would smell as sweet, and a Temperance Brennan by any other name would be just as brilliant, honest, driven and gifted. Returning to her friend with the bare outline of a plan, Angela sat beside her and deliberately called her name. "Brennan, what's going on."

As predicted, Brennan stiffened and her face went blank. But quite unexpectedly, she issued a clipped request. "Please don't call me that."

"Why not? It's your name."

"No it isn't."

_Here we go._ Angela narrowed her eyes, deciding logic would work up to a point, but pride was probably going to be the best route to take in the long run. "Your ID says your name is Temperance Brennan. You told me you don't care for Temperance because it's too formal and I told you I don't care for Tempe. It's a boring town in Arizona with bad memories for me. So ... Brennan. That's your name."

"No," she contradicted bitterly. "I'm Joy Keenan, the daughter of bank robbers and liars, the kind of people who walk off and abandon their children." Joy. Even the word tasted wrong, souring the sweet flavor of Jasmine. She swallowed a gulp of the fragrant tea to wash the word out of her mouth. "They took Joy away from me and they made me an outsider who never fit in."

_"Same old Tempe. Never met a rule worth breaking,"_ her brother had mocked. She'd countered with, _"Same old Russ. In jail,"_ because she'd thought that differentiated him from her, from their mother the bookkeeper and their father the science teacher. And then not an hour later he'd gotten the last laugh when the truth was revealed: their parents were bank robbers and he was a car thief. "Looks like a criminal nature runs in the family."

So now she knew the full explanation, the truth she'd always sort of felt even when Russ had called Marco. The fact that he'd even needed to should have made it clear._ She_ was the outsider, the one who didn't fit. The one they all lied to and then finally left behind.

Speechless at Brennan's uncharacteristic outburst, Angela tried to figure out what she was talking about. "How ... did they make you an outsider?"

"Christine, Matthew, Russ. They're all normal names. Why did they pick Temperance? I never fit in anywhere and apparently not with them, either. You know the root of the word is Latin and it means to regulate? They made me follow the rules and all the while they were breaking them."

Sometimes (oh, who was she kidding, almost all the time) Brennan knew too much and over-thought things. Temperance also means moderation, and that had to imply there was a better reason for her name than parents looking to ostracize their own daughter. Angela tilted her head, regarding Brennan curiously and with a trace of hopeful humor because she knew from the stories she'd told of them that Brennan had loved her parents, and that Brennan herself had been a spirited child. "I bet you were a hellion when you were little. Maybe Temperance was an ironic wish, a hope that someday you'd learn moderation and self control."

"Or maybe it was a curse," she countered bitterly. "Steel is tempered by heating it and cooling it repeatedly."

"You know what? It doesn't matter why they chose that name. It's yours."

"It isn't," Brennan insisted with a dark flare of anger. "They left me with nothing."

"Come here."

Without waiting, Angela grabbed Brennan's arm and escorted her to her own office and she stopped to point to the business cards Brennan had sitting on the edge of her desk. She took one and showed it to Brennan. "What does that say?" No answer, not that she'd expected one. "Doctor Temperance Brennan. You."

She didn't say anything, just looked lost and unsure and Angela hated seeing her like that.

"Who sat in all those classrooms taking notes and acing exams? Who traveled all over the globe doing research and gathering data? Who wrote three dissertations in one year and earned three PhDs before the age of 25? _You_ did. You did all that work. And what name is on those diplomas? Temperance Brennan. That's your name. You earned it. It's yours."

"It's stolen," Brennan whispered, as she were complicit in the act of theft that had happened on her behalf at the tender age of two.

"No, you know what? How your parents ended up with the name doesn't matter. Maybe it meant something to them. Look at my name. My dad named me Pearly Gates which is just ridiculous! I barely escaped middle school with that name. I hated it. But do you know why he chose it? Because, he said, being with my mother brought him to the pearly gates of heaven. He loved her that much, and I remind him of her. So it's a stupid name that I pretend isn't mine most of the time, but I keep it because it means something to my dad.

"Maybe Temperance meant something to your parents. A wish for you, or..." Suddenly the idea hit her, the real reason. "Maybe your parents were wishing for Temperance for all of you. Self control, moderation, a life lived by the rules. They went straight..."

Brennan gasped a little.

"Booth told me about the bank robberies," Angela confessed not in the least bit apologetic. "They became a bookkeeper and a science teacher. Living within the law. It's the life they wanted, and you were their daily reminder."

Her eyes glowed like moonstones. "Do you think it's possible?"

"Isn't that a better story than the one you've been telling yourself...?"

~Q~

It was a beautiful story. It sounded so beautiful that Brennan clung to that story throughout the next hours.

But the lies kept piling on. Her parents were robbers, maybe murderers as well. Fugitives from the FBI who had gotten mixed in with gun-running white supremacists. Brennan didn't flinch when she heard that, but she felt the blood drop out of her head and nearly swayed in her seat. For the first time since he'd revealed her name, Brennan glanced at her brother and saw the same shock and disbelief on his face and that, at least, was a comfort.

Booth came again at midnight with a special delivery from Wong Fu's and an assurance that they still hadn't uncovered all the pieces of the story.

Every piece they did uncover only added to the horrible pile. Russ recalled to Angela the face of a man whom Max Keenan had pointed out as a danger, giving Booth enough information to track the man down. He was a former 'mechanic' (which apparently meant 'hitman'), who worked as a pig farmer under the protected witness program. Angela had done an admirable job restoring Brennan's faith in herself, but the artist's work unraveled when a former white supremacist hitman tried to tell Brennan he'd had an affair with her mother, that her own father had killed her mother.

He called her Joy, the name of a criminal's daughter, a racist's daughter. An enemy to herself and all she'd worked to achieve.

Brennan tried to cling to what Angela had told her. She was Dr. Temperance Brennan. She identified people. She'd worked hard, she'd earned her name. She'd written books under that name and taught students. She identified victims of genocide. She worked with the FBI to help victims of murder and put criminals away. But she didn't know if it was true anymore, or if it had ever been true.

"Hey," Booth said gently. "I know who you are."

He was standing behind her, like he so often did. He was always there, quiet and strong, and though they were in a sun-speckled barn with musty hay, it felt like that dark and moonless night on the National Mall. Pain had splintered her and Booth said, "I know." Then and now, he knew. She turned into him, just as then, buried her tears on his shoulders and felt his arms band around her to hold her pieces together.

"Who am I?" she cried. He'd said he knew.

"You're Bones," he whispered. "You speak for the dead."

Bones. He'd named her, too. That very first case together, for reasons she still didn't fully understand, Booth had called her a name that described what she knew, that honored what she could do. He gave it to her and he wouldn't take it back (even when she'd asked him to).

"Booth?" She lifted her head to ask him and saw he was looking right into her, seeing everything she was. "Will you always call me that?"

Tenderly he brushed a tear away. "Is that what you want?"

"Only you."

His warm smile healed her raw edges. "To me, you'll always be Bones," he promised. And she was. Seven years would pass before he called her Temperance again.

~Q~

"I've figured it out," Angela said. She found Brennan submerged in Limbo, gazing pensively at a skull.

Brennan's focus slowly shifted from bone to flesh, empty orbits to curious brown orbs. "What have you figured out?"

"We're opposites."

Frowning, she set the skull down and gave more of her attention to the artist. "You mean because you're emotional and I'm rational?"

"That's part of it." Angela glanced over at the skull and felt the face shaping itself in her mind's eye. They came fluently to her now, effortlessly. Glancing at the file spread open at Brennan's right hand, she read off the number. "Jane Doe, 20020318. Can you see her?"

Instinctively, she lifted the skull and traced her fingers over the zygomatic arches. "I can today. Last week I couldn't. I wanted to know what she looked like."

"She was beautiful," Angela said softy.

"Yes." Brennan reluctantly parted with the skull again, losing the connection and feeling once again that nothing made sense. "Why couldn't I see her before? Or my mother."

Touching her shoulder as if in warning, Angela offered the answer. "Because you were still happy last week. Now the pain is back."

"Pain?" Bewilderment blossomed over Brennan's drawn features. She was still experiencing physical symptoms of discomfort, the headaches, the scuffing noise, and the worse it felt, the more brightly their faces flared. The more distinctly their bones gave up whispered secrets.

"Emotional pain," Angela clarified. "Grief. Sadness. Maybe fear and anger. All the dark things."

Withdrawing from the compassionate touch, she pulled back. "That doesn't make sense."

"Why doesn't it?"

"Because..." Another one of those paralyzing direct gazes hit the artist, working double time because it was accompanied by the truth. "You still saw Kirk even though you were in pain when he disappeared. If we were really opposites, you wouldn't have seen him."

She sighed and wondered why everything had to be a battle of wits. "Fine, we're near opposites. Is that better? I had to let go of ... light, I guess. I had to learn to live with death. You started to embrace life, and I think that's why you stopped seeing them."

The possibility filled her with a sense of panic. She was Bones, the identity she'd clung to when everything fell apart. Losing that part of herself would mean losing the only part that was truly hers. But she couldn't deny that it hurt, physically and emotionally, when she looked at them. It was a pain she'd gotten used to, a pain that spelled her purpose. Without it, who would she be? Who did Angela think she would be? "Who am I if I don't see them anymore?"

"The same person you always were," Angela explained with a certainty she'd earned through experience. "This is just one part of you. You're a genius, you're a good friend, a gifted writer. You're so many things, and now you can be happy. It's okay to live, just enjoy life."

"But I can't walk away from them. They need justice." Brennan felt guilt pulling her into pieces because the suggestion of not having to hurt so much was tempting, yet the act of abandoning the defenseless dead would be wrong. "How can I help them if I can't see them?"

This was it, Angela knew. This was the meaning in the cards. Brennan wasn't Temperance any longer and now someone else had to be the seer. This was what the cards foretold all those months ago._ "It also means friendship, partnership,"_ Avalon had translated, _"the coming together of two distinct beings that must function as one."_

"You don't have to see them anymore," Angela offered softly. "You've got me."

"No," Brennan resisted. "It hurts you. You can't do it alone."

"We're not alone," she reasoned. "You've got me and Booth. I've got you, and Hodgins and Zack. You look at their bodies and I'll see their faces for you."

"Angela, you can't do that for me," Brennan pleaded.

"I've already been doing it the last few months, you just didn't realize it." The artist smiled and it wasn't sad at all. It was really rather loving. "I had to learn how to embrace death, so you could have a chance to embrace life."

Stunned, Brennan looked between the skull and her friend, hesitating.

Angela stepped in front of the skull, blocking her view. "Take it."

~Q~

* * *

**~ The End of Part One ~**

Author's Note: This could be the end. It feels like a nice stopping point. So that brings me to a question for you, the readers.

The Question: Are you happy with this ending, or would you like the story to continue? Please let me know with votes through reviews or PM.

If the majority votes to continue, the story will go another 15-20 chapters and the direction will skew a little more towards romantic AU. I have interesting reasons, which will hopefully justify the slightly greater AU overtones of certain events in the short-term. In the long term, nothing really changes and the story is still firmly in canon.

If the votes are to end the story here, I'll post one more chapter that brings it back to the beginning with Ghost in the Machine and ties that up.

Because I'll be letting the readers decide, the next chapter (21) will definitely update later than next Friday (but probably no later than Tuesday, 2 April).

~Q~

_The Verdict:_ The votes leaned heavily towards continuation. Therefore, Part Two begins in chapter 21.


	21. The Past in the Prologue

Author's Note: First, I must beg an apology and an indulgence of you dear readers. On the 22nd I decided to post Chapter 20 on time, but lacking the quality that it should have had. Since then I've edited it and completed it. Therefore, if you read Chapter 20 before the 24th (Sunday), you may want to return to it and read it again. It's much more 'finished' now than it was when I first posted it.

And that brings me to my next point: I've learned from this experience that it's better to be a little bit late with higher quality than to post poor quality work 'on time.' I know this is a complete reversal of what I said before. As I learn how to write on a schedule, I've realized I need to switch from college _'late assignments will not be accepted'_ mode to publishing _'this will be here for years'_ mode.

I've been working hard over Spring break and I've got the next five chapters plotted and well under way. Starting on the 12th I hope to be firmly back on the Friday update schedule, with enough reserve chapters to keep the stress levels down.

Okay, enough rambling. We're changing gears now that the foundation is set. Shakespeare wrote in the second act of the Tempest, that what happened before was the prologue for the remainder of the play. Same goes for this story: what you've read in the first 20 chapters sets up everything that follows next. I'm going to begin skipping forward at higher speeds because there's a lot of ground to cover.

* * *

~Q~

~The Past in the Prologue~

~Q~

**We all were sea-swallow'd, though some cast again**  
**(And by that destiny) to perform an act**  
**Whereof what's past is prologue; what to come,**  
**In yours and my discharge.**

_The Tempest, Act II, Scene 1, Lines 251-254_

~Q~

"You don't have to see them anymore," Angela offered softly. "You've got me. ... I had to learn how to embrace death, so you could have a chance to embrace life."

Stunned, Brennan looked between the skull and her friend, hesitating.

Angela stepped in front of the skull, blocking her view. "Take it."

~Q~

**September 2006**

"So, Booth picked you up at the airport again." Angela breezed into her office with two cups of coffee and deposited one on Brennan's desk before promptly depositing herself on the sofa and awaiting what she hoped would be a story worth getting up this early to hear. It was just past seven, still cool and dewey outside, and yet she counted the lost sleep a worthy sacrifice because the last time Booth had retrieved Temperance Brennan from an airport, someone had gotten bruised. "How did that go?"

"Fine." Having only just gotten in herself after a brief rush home to toss her bags, shower and rush right back, Brennan slid her messenger bag onto the floor and suffered Angela's enthusiastic greeting with a tired smile and a single explanation that was quite effective in quelling Angela's romantic hopes for her. "He took me straight out to the train wreck."

"What a way to welcome you home: rain, mud, corpses and mangled metal." She shook her head in disapproval and added with a knowing sigh. "I suppose you were thrilled."

Frowning, Brennan wondered at the wry disapproval she heard in Angela's comment. Relieved to be back in DC, back in the Jeffersonian, back in her life...? Yes. Thrilled over a derailed train that had killed several people, including a senator? No. What kind of monster would be glad that people had died? The work at the site of the derailment had felt normal but not thrilling in the least. In fact, more than one aspect of her work last night had proved unsettling. "Don't forget the new boss. I'm not thrilled about that."

Flopping backwards with a dramatic sigh, the artist rolled her eyes. "Oh, you met Dr. Saroyan, huh?"

"Why didn't you tell me Goodman hired a pathologist and put her in charge?" Brennan tossed a reproachful glance at her friend as she unpacked her laptop and set it up on her desk. Finding out she had a new boss through Booth, in front of said new boss, had been humiliating.

"You were out of the country and out of contact," Angela reminded her. "Darfur, three weeks, no email. How was I supposed to tell you?"

"I didn't go to Darfur." Angela had implored her to start living, and with the bones refusing to give up their secrets so easily as they had before, she'd decided to spend her time somewhere less extreme. Perhaps, in her haste to rush off and try something new, she may have forgotten to let Angela in on the change of plans.

Surprised, Angela lifted herself back out of her reclined position on the couch. "What? When did you change your mind?"

"After you dropped me off at the airport." Brennan sighed as she recognized her error. She wasn't used to thinking about other people caring where she went. No one ever had before.

"So…?" The artist prompted. When information failed to issue forth quickly enough to satisfy her, she demanded impatiently, "Then where did you go?"

"North Carolina." The laptop was plugged in and charging, leaving Brennan with little else to occupy her hands. She grabbed up the waiting coffee cup instead and sipped the fresh brew appreciatively.

That came as a second surprise this morning and Angela didn't bother to hide her delight. "To visit Russ? Really?"

"Yes." Another sip. The coffee was fresh and very hot, a perfect gift. Not for the first time, Brennan found herself wondering how she had come to have a generous friend like Angela.

Another unfilled silence had Angela sighing in bemusement. At times, the skulls she worked on were more forthcoming about personal information than the anthropologist was. She always had to work at it with Brennan, sliding bits of personal information around like puzzle pieces. What she'd learned just before Brennan left was that Brennan's fugitive father was alive and knew her home phone number. He'd called and told her to stop looking for him.

Russ was as much in the dark as his sister, maybe. Their fifteen-year estrangement was only just now coming to an end and it would have been easier for Brennan to trust him if he hadn't abandoned her and withheld her birth name for over twenty years. "You must have worked things out with him, forgiven him. How did it go?"

"It was fine. When did Dr. Saroyan get here?"

Not about to be diverted so easily, Angela waved that question off. "Two weeks ago. Did you two get caught up?"

"No, we didn't talk."

"You didn't talk? Uh, then how did you manage to work it out?"

Brennan regarded Angela curiously, clearly thinking the artist wasn't making any sense. "She told me to look at the burned body in the car."

A blank look was followed by mental backtracking as Angela attempted to figure out where one of them had gotten lost. Finally, a clarification. "I was talking about you and Russ."

"Oh." Brennan shrugged then, following the switch in topic easily enough and sidetracking it as quickly as possible. "Yes, I suppose we've caught up. I met his girlfriend, Amy."

Figuring she'd pried enough, Angela accepted the nudging off-topic gracefully. "Oh, that sounds good. Is she nice?"

"I … have no way of objectively knowing that."

"Well, did you like her?"

"Yes."

Angela nodded. "Then she's nice. It's completely _sub_jective, Bren."

Brennan had slipped into her lab coat and now she paused beside her friend as she quickly twisted her hair into a bun. "Is Dr. Saroyan nice?"

One of Angela's best qualities was an abiding sense of humor. She raised a brow and reminded, "I have no way of _objectively_ knowing whether _you, subjectively_ think she's nice."

For her effort, she received a withering scowl, which only made her laugh. "A certain anthropologist I know would insist there's no knowing without evidence. So let's go. Give me evidence and I'll give you a verdict on the nice factor of Camille Saroyan."

"I think Booth and Dr. Saroyan already know each other," Brennan volunteered quietly. She watched Angela for a reaction because this was the sort of thing the artist always seemed to detect.

"Biblically," Angela agreed with a smirk.

"Dr. Saroyan is Catholic?"

"No," she chuckled and corrected the mistake. "Those two have knocked boots in the past and they're thinking about it now."

"Knocked boots." Forming various mental images of kicking shins, dancing, throwing boots at barn walls, she finally gave up when nothing made sense.

Brennan's bewilderment didn't clear up on its own, so she decided it was time for blunt. "Sex, Sweetie. They've had sex."

Brennan halted, a stricken look blooming before she could uproot it. Angela glanced over at her and wondered if this nudge might finally propel some soul searching. "Why do you care," she asked carefully. "You two are just partners, remember?"

Gathering her composure, she strode forward and clipped out her confirmation. "Of course. I don't care, I was just surprised by Dr. Saroyan's unprofessional behavior last night."

_Yeah, I'm sure that's what it is,_ Angela thought as she followed a step behind.

~Q~

"Grab your coat, Bones, we're going on a stakeout."

"We are?" She turned in surprise as Booth slammed into the lab wearing off-duty jeans and a T-shirt.

"Got a lead on that heroin; DC Metro thinks it's being sold by a dealer named Eddie." He slipped a palm against her back and propelled her towards her office. "We want to get out there just after it gets dark."

Brennan stalled, confused at his urgency given how early it still was. Late afternoon sun still spilled amber light into the western windows of the lab. "But that's in two hours. What's your rush?"

"Dinner first," he grinned. It was the friendly, I-know-you-won't-say-no grin she was coming to know almost as well as the charm smile. (And that charm smile, she'd decided, was best described as 'I know you _want_ to say no so I'm giving you a grin that will weaken your knees as well as your will.' It was quite effective.)

Of course, she reminded herself. Some things never changed and Booth's perpetual hunger was one of them.

Telling herself he was only inviting her as a means of conveying important information regarding proper stakeout procedures, Brennan made certain her face betrayed none of the adrenal excitement her heart was pumping through her body. It was just Booth and business, not a date. Still, it was hard to focus on anything else when he stood so near and smiled at her that way. Sweeping up her jacket and bag, Brennan started back out and stopped when Booth's palm at her shoulder gently pushed her back.

He was smiling still, a teasing glint flashing at her as his fingers curled around her forearm just long enough to halt her forward momentum. "Whoa, there. Aren't you forgetting something?"

Frowning, she glanced around and noticed nothing amiss.

He laughed at her then, fully amused at her evident lack of focus and tweaked her collar. "You're still wearing your lab coat."

Oh. Brennan groaned, chagrined at the lapse and worried he'd misinterpret the cause. Or worse, that he'd correctly interpret the cause. "I've had a lot on my mind," she defended. The coat came off with an impatient tug and found its place on her coat tree.

"You thinking about your dad?"

"Yes." But that wasn't all. Thoughts of Biblical knowing and Camille Saroyan stomped through her head and made her wonder what else he knew about the woman she now reported to. "Booth?"

"Yes, Bones?"

The deliberate parroting of her words only dimly registered. "How did you know Cam was my boss? You don't work at the Jeffersonian."

He had his hand ready to usher her forward as she passed him and the question didn't seem to bother him at all. "Word gets around," he answered. "If you'd look up from your bones once in a while, you'd have a better sense of what the living people around you are doing."

She paused and looked back at him curiously. "I wasn't looking at bones. I was with Russ."

He stopped only a few inches away, radiating the intensity that always sizzled against her skin. "Yeah, and the entire time you were there, you didn't get in touch with anyone here. You were all about Russ, right? You see, sometimes your focus is too narrow. You gotta step back a little and take in the periphery. Stop looking at the bark on the tree and notice the actual tree, not to mention the whole forest. You understand?"

She was starting to think there was a distinct lack of justice in the way Booth's mere proximity could stimulate her limbic system into overdrive. Take now, for instance. Booth's aftershave had been refreshed so recently that she could feel it brushing against her nose and mouth in a sweet caress and it had completely short-circuited her higher cognitive functions. All she could think of was how good he smelled while her abandoned intellect stumbled out an unintelligible reply. "People and trees, it's a metaphor."

"Ah, Bones," he sighed affectionately. "You've got a lot to learn."

"Like how to do a stakeout," she agreed. _And how to understand you,_ she added mentally. And how in the hell was she going to survive the next few hours sitting right next to him in a dark, parked car?

"And why Cam got the job instead of you," he finished, mercifully misunderstanding why she was so damn distracted lately.

~Q~

In the following days, Brennan came to understand that nearly everyone around her had changed in some way. Or, perhaps, none had changed and it was she herself who had come to view them all differently the moment she'd stopped hearing the bones.

Angela and Hodgins were flirting with each other. When had that started...?

In a stunning act of cowardice, Dr. Goodman had waited until she was on vacation to withdraw his direct supervision and without even announcing he'd created the new position, he left a pathologist (beautiful, sarcastic and clearly enamored with Booth) in charge. Then he'd dashed off on a sabbatical, leaving Brennan with no recourse.

Asking Angela why Goodman would appoint Dr. Saroyan by stealth yielded an odd discussion that echoed what Booth had told her about seeing trees. "For example," Angela supplied near the end, "When's my birthday."

This was an excellent, concrete example Brennan agreed, even as she pointed out she could use a computer to remind her of birthdays. Why clutter up her brain with unimportant information?

"That's just one example," Angela insisted. She declined to offer more.

Dr. Saroyan, Brennan decided, was an alpha female determined to establish herself as the dominant force in the lab and Brennan, champion of pure science and the Truth, told herself she would not give in to office politics. The fact that Dr. Saroyan also had designs on Booth just made Brennan's antipathy all that much stronger. They clashed over and over while her friends tried to stay out of the crossfire.

Then there was Booth. He'd confused her most of all. One minute he was giving Brennan those intense gazes that rolled her heart like thunder; the next, he was standing millimeters away from Camile Saroyan and trading cool jokes and heated glances. Brennan watched from the sidelines, growing ever more uncertain. Had she been wrong? Had she misunderstood him once again? What she'd perceived as interest, had only been Booth charm liberally applied...?

Between Booth, Angela, Cam's performances and Brennan's reluctant honesty, she eventually saw the truth for what it was. Not for nothing had Shakespeare written, _"The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool."_ Brennan, not a fool, knew she had a fatal weakness when it came to understanding people and relationships.

Camille Saroyan did not, and in the battle for interpersonal dominance, Cam was winning.

Somehow from the moment Dr. Saroyan arrived, the growing intimacy Brennan had shared with Booth had evaporated and left her parched, and before she fully grasped what she'd lost Camille was lifting the glass in her place. She didn't understand how the physics of relationships worked, it seemed, because despite her best effort at improving, Brennan felt herself being mostly acted upon by forces outside of herself.

In hindsight, it was the machinations of an old enemy that drove the biggest wedge in between them.

~Q~

On a cool October morning they walked together through a sun-dappled forest. For a while the scent of sweetly spiced earth and pine needles crushing underfoot nearly masked the decay that awaited them at their destination. Booth teased her about getting a puppy when she threw a pine cone to drive away a Doberman Pincer that was guarding a freshly discovered skeleton. "I'd rather have a (cleaner and far more intelligent) pig," she clarified but the subject was dropped when the dog departed and Brennan bent to take a look at the treasure it had guarded.

Wispy blond hairs still clung to a badly damaged skull. The teen girl was buried face down, and something about that pose struck her as significant. Brennan fondled the bones longingly, wishing she could still sense what they might tell her. The only sounds that she heard came from the early autumn breeze, the muffled chatter of police radios, and Booth quietly questioning the dog owner who had called in the find. The bones themselves were as quiet as an ancient find, faceless and lifeless.

Not until they'd returned the young woman's body to the lab and Hodgins discovered traces of adhesive on the girl's wrists did Brennan put the clues together. Killed over seven years ago. Wrists bound, buried face down. Blond, young, blunt force trauma to the head from a tire iron.

"Epps."

Howard Epps.

Was this what Booth meant when he talked about feeling things with his intestines? Though she had no empirical proof that Epps had killed this girl, Brennan's intestines seemed to have twisted themselves into tight and painful knots at the prospect of facing that manipulative monster again. Everything with Epps was intentional.

Booth went alone and returned to report Epps was keenly interested in seeing Brennan, and "he _really_ … needed his wrist." The one she'd broken when he'd touched her. The one he would use to ...

"Ah, chronic masterbation!" Zack exclaimed.

The right wrist. She looked down at the teen girl, looked where the clue pointed.

As if they hadn't already learned how deep the game he could play was, Brennan found a single Hamate bone in the young woman's right wrist that didn't belong there because it didn't belong to _her_. Epps had taunted Booth to bring in Brennan when she found it so she went, submerging her discomfort and distaste under the higher goal of finding out who else was dead, which in the grand scheme of things was probably more important than avoiding an awkward afternoon with a sociopath. If he gave her any trouble, she would simply break the cretin's other wrist.

"Dr. Brennan, you came." He smiled a sickly grimace, the words oozing double meanings right from the very beginning.

Brennan sat in silence, listening to his ramblings with an intensity that even Booth had never seen before. She watched the killer carefully, noting facial expressions that meant almost nothing to her as Epps muttered about washing his hands in ammonia and he should have killed his mother first, putting her under a stone cross.

"Okay," she said softly. There was a message hidden in his random utterings. Ammonia would be important, and a stone cross. A first victim, perhaps the owner of the wrong wrist bone. A cross, something about religion, Christianity. She used mnemonic devices to segment the messages for later reproduction to Hodgins and Zack. Maybe Angela, also. Brennan nodded briefly to Epps. "Okay."

She was up and out before Booth knew why. He chased her out of the interview chamber with a questioning glance. "You understood all of that?"

"Not really," she admitted, intent on making her escape just as her finely tuned sense of self preservation had been insisting for the last hour.

"Then, why did you leave?"

_Because I couldn't stand to be in that bastard's presence even a moment longer._ And, "He expects me to solve his riddles." She glanced up at Booth sideways, surprised he didn't realize her capacity to understand was greater than it appeared. "The clues were specific, but I don't know what they mean yet. I have to go back and look at the evidence again."

"Do you think you can figure them out?"

They were approaching the exit to the prison. Brennan crossed her arms and shivered slightly. Though freedom beckoned just beyond the heavy doors, she knew she was already trapped in Epps's game. "I have to."

~Q~

She had to, because there was a young woman being held upside down and tortured by an accomplice right at that very moment. Epps knew who had her, maybe even knew where, and he left the trail of stones and bones for Brennan to follow in the dark with only the barest hint of hope that she could reach Helen Majors in time.

"For all your faults, you never made your victims suffer," Brennan told Epps, brandishing psychology as a desperate weapon of last resort when nothing else seemed to work. "She's an innocent girl."

He leaned forward, his flat brown eyes penetrating her while the low sound of longing and lust growled out of him. "There's no such thing as an innocent woman." Though her instincts with people were not sharp, Brennan felt his desire coating her unpleasantly: the way he looked her over, the way his eyes drifted to places that were covered and off limits. Whatever he desired of her, Brennan suspected Epps had convinced himself she was entirely the one to blame. His feelings were her fault.

The fact that she wasn't his type confused her until something one of the victim's parents mentioned floated to the surface of her mind. Epps had said the young woman reminded him of his mother. And Epps had told Brennan he wished he'd have killed his mother first and buried her under a stone cross.

_I don't look like his victims,_ Brennan realized. Did his obsession with her mean she reminded him somehow of his mother? Did it mean something else? Why had he singled her out to play this game? This is why she hated psychology, she reminded herself. It didn't make sense and really, who cared why he liked to bash in the heads of teenaged blond girls.

Someone else was holding Helen Majors, and Epps was dangling clues that might help her save the girl. He laughed and told her Helen only had 24 hours left. "Better get going…"

~Q~

The wise woman knows she is a fool. Foolish Brennan found Angela in her office and begged for wisdom.

"What are you asking _me_ for?" Angela asked. She set aside the skull she'd been working on with a grimace.

Bluntly, she reminded Angela that her own checkered history with men might have prepared her for this, and it was that experience that was now so sorely needed. "You said you've dealt with manipulative men before."

Angela looked slightly rattled. "Sweetie, this is a psycho killer, not some loser who wants you to co-sign for his jet ski."

"Epps is pushing me around, Ange. He's in control. I _hate_ that." She was terrified and disoriented, actually. Most disturbing to her was the fact that even Booth seemed at a loss. This game was between her and Epps but she didn't understand the rules.

The wry observation was tinged with dark humor. "You know, Epps is acting kind of like a boyfriend."

Brennan huffed a small, disbelieving laugh. "What?!"

"Well, you obviously fascinate him."

This much Brennan had deduced on her own. Epps had fixated on her, for reasons she still couldn't quite grasp. Whether it was her appearance, her intelligence, the fact that she'd broken his wrist, or something else she had yet to recognize, something had caught his revolting admiration. He lured her to visit, implied he masterbated to fantasies of her, and gave her clues that might help her save a life, but only if she decoded them fast enough.

Angela continued thoughtfully, "He can't have you, and he can't kill you..."

Again, nothing Brennan hadn't already begun to understand. He wanted her; he wanted something out of her.

"...So, he wants to make you hate yourself."

She reacted with shock and disbelief, almost laughing again because none of her 'boyfriends' had ever behaved this way. The insight was rather horrifying, that Angela would be familiar enough with such twisted relationships to recognize what Epps wanted. "God, Ange, what kind of boyfriends have you had?"

Angela's own defenses went into play almost immediately. "Let's keep the focus on you and Epps, okay?"

"Okay," she agreed quietly. Now wasn't the right time to delve into it, anyway. This would be the sort of discussion that commenced after midnight, accompanied by mournful music and the consumption of two bottles of wine and a shared gallon of Cherry Garcia ice cream. (Angela's rules for girlfriend disclosures, indelibly ingrained in her when her relationship with Peter had started to turn sour.)

Serious now, Angela laid bare how well he had come to know Brennan in just those few interactions. In a way, Epps was an evil Booth, reading her and using his insights into her character against her. "Epps knows that you'll never forgive yourself if you don't find Helen Majors before she's murdered."

She knew Angela was probably correct. His last words to her, 'better get going...' demonstrated just how much he was capable of manipulating her.

He was tormenting so many people with his game. Did he grasp what it was doing to Helen's family, this not knowing? Did he understand how that felt? Brennan felt sick as the familiar depth of their suffering lodged itself in her head. "Not only is Helen being tortured but, her family must be in agony."

_And so am I,_ she understood with horror. He _knows_. Epps knew her that well; God, had he Googled her or something? Read her books, read into her? Read Booth's protectiveness, read everything.

Angela broke in with compassion. "You see? This is what he's doing. He's putting pictures in your mind. He's messing with your objectivity."

"There's nothing I can do about that." Swallowing the emerging nausea with effort, Brennan wondered how Booth or Angela could function when the pain came from the living. All she could think of was the pain Helen's parents must be suffering, all she could imagine was Helen's terror and the looming weight of guilt when she failed to find Helen in time. Helen is still alive, still in pain, still in agony and terror and she couldn't stop it.

She couldn't stop it because in all the lessons on human interactions, she'd forgotten how to be rational. All that pain was a distraction.

And it was why he was going to win. She was already starting to hate herself, her weakness.

"You have to step back, okay? Let the rest of us deal with the families. You find Helen. That'll keep Epps from getting a jet ski out of you."

How did Booth do this, Brennan wondered in despair. How did he function with his compassionate heart? Why didn't the pain blind him the way it blinded her? Sensing Angela was correct, Brennan withdrew from the school of life she'd recently enrolled herself in and kept her focus on what Sarah Koskoff's bones could still tell her.

When she and Booth finally found young Helen still alive, Brennan hoped they would quickly arrest Gil Lappin and call it a night. But Lappin had slipped away from them...

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Mind games aplenty are in store in the next chapter. I never realized just how manipulative Epps was until I viewed his episodes as a trilogy over Spring Break. Wow, he left an impact (and not just on the pavement).


	22. The Price of Partnership

Author's Note: My epiphany about season two runs twofold. Brennan had to learn how to form relationships with people, how to take that emotional risk. And Booth had to learn how to work with a true partner. In season one, Brennan was a tag-along. In season two, she's right there at his side (or his back), taking risks with him, and he has to figure out how to accept that she's really his partner in all ways (work related).

* * *

~Q~

~The Price of Partnership~

~Q~

**Better be with the dead**  
** Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace,**  
** Than on the torture of the mind to lie**  
** In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave;**  
** After life's fitful fever he sleeps well.**

_Macbeth, Act III, Scene 2, Lines 19-23_

~Q~

_"Usually I enjoy your company, but times like these you give me something extra to worry about."_

He'd told her that only once, but he'd thought it probably a dozen times since. Her safety was his responsibility and letting her walk right into a hostage situation was not safe by any stretch of definition. The only reason he let her come with him tonight was the same reason he should have handcuffed her to the damn car instead: he had no back up, and time was running out for Helen Majors.

Inside the cavernous postal sorting center, as his eyes adjusted to dim lights and shadowed hidey holes galore, his senses screamed at him to protect their flank. Lappin could pop out of anywhere and two eyes, two guns, were better than one. So he stopped and yanked his extra piece free of his ankle holster and passed it to her.

"Here."

"I didn't even have to ask." Its warm weight transferred his sense of urgency to her, because this was the first time he'd ever just handed a weapon over without her first having to defend the logic for doing so. Balancing her flashlight below the gun, Brennan kept behind Booth as he'd so often instructed her. This was another change from a year ago: she could remember him forbidding her to accompany him into obviously risky situations in the fairly recent past.

"Yeah, well, just be careful. All right?" They kept walking and he tried to inject a bit of humor into the situation. "Don't shoot me. Don't shoot Helen Majors, otherwise…" He halted everything because they both heard the rattling of chains echo throughout the darkened, deserted sorting center.

Booth glanced back at Brennan, noted her eyes were wide and dilated. She met his gaze with alert caution, fully recognizing the seriousness of having a living victim as well as a dangerous murderer to worry about. Silently, Booth moved back into the lead and Brennan came behind, glancing around herself with senses on hyper-alert.

As they approached the source of the noise, a soft whimpering sounded. "Please…"

Booth stepped up to a square of glass inset with security wire. A blond girl, around 5 foot 9, was hanging upside down by her ankles, her golden hair falling like rain below her head. The height of the girls struck him then as he sensed Brennan stepping to his right. They were all fairly tall, like his partner.

Maybe blond wasn't the thing that drew Epps. He recalled what Epps had said before_. "The girl who got murdered was smart. She was pretty. She was from a good family. Someone has to pay for that."_ Smart, pretty, rich? Tall. Bones. He swallowed down the scream of guilt that he'd been the one to drag her into Epps's sights. She shouldn't be here. Turning to send her back outside where she would be safe, the impulse to protect her at all costs never made it outside of his head.

Because beside him, Brennan released a sharp hiss of horror when she spotted Helen, and he knew there was no way his headstrong partner was going to leave now.

"Please," Helen begged the silence again, her voice faint from what Brennan knew would be an unbearable pounding of blood in her head. How long had she been that way? Impulsively Brennan pivoted and dashed for the door.

Breathing a silent curse, Booth sprinted after her and pushed her aside with a fierce glare, reminding her to stay the hell back. "Helen?" he said cautiously as they approached.

"Please," the terrified girl gasped, hope creeping into her exhaustion. "Please help me!"

"All right. All right. Easy." Booth gripped Helen by the shoulders, lifting her to a more horizontal position to relieve the pressure of gravity. He didn't need a medical background to be familiar with how much pain Helen would be in. He'd spent plenty of time upside down himself, once, when the Iraqis played around with various methods of torture.

Brennan grabbed the power switch and activated the chain, lowering Helen while Booth held her steady and continued to issue his reassurances. "It's okay, I've got you."

He'd said that to her, once, almost exactly the same words, almost exactly the same situation. His solid arms, his warm body, his scent enveloping her as he brought her down off the hook. She'd sobbed in relief just the way Helen was crying now and held on and wished he would never leave her. Brennan shivered as the memory thrust through her bubble of exclusivity and she faced the recognition that Booth was a hero to many, not just her.

But that time, Kenton had been standing right next to her, already eliminated when Booth pulled her into his arms. This time, Lappin was missing. The danger wasn't over and no one could relax. He was around here somewhere, waiting to pounce.

_This was too easy,_ he thought. She was just hanging here, easily found, the sound of hoisting chains guiding them right to her. Booth was still the sniper, still the soldier, and he knew Lappin was laying in wait somewhere. "Where is he," he asked Helen while his eyes swept the dark.

"He just left," Helen sobbed, nearly incoherent. "I don't know where he went, he just left."

"Bones." He looked up at her, eyes harder than she'd ever seen them as he gave the harsh command. "Stay _here_. With her."

_No, no, no._ Brennan's pulse was raging, making her breathless and dizzy on epinephrine overload at the thought of letting him leave. Alone. Leaving _him_ alone.

"Wait right there," he insisted, seeing her begin a refusal. Before she could disagree verbally he was already moving away, moving on swiftly silent feet like a panther.

Helen's sobs tore at her sympathy, but terror over Booth ripped more deeply still. Brennan wished irrationally that she could tear herself in two, be two places at once. The girl needed comfort and Booth needed backup, yet she wasn't well equipped to handle either task. And where the hell were all the other agents he'd called in?

"Don't leave me," Helen begged. "Please don't leave me."

Brennan bit her lip, fighting a confusing torrent of emotions. Most she couldn't name, but fear for Booth dominated and drove her into a decision. Resolutely, she set to work on the bindings tying Helen's wrists and ankles.

"I'm going to leave you for a few minutes," Brennan warned in a whisper the moment Helen was released. "You go hide over there, in the shadows. We'll be back."

"No! No, _please_ don't go!"

"Shh! Just … I have to go." She didn't know where this urgency was coming from but it drove her like a whip against her heart. _I have to go, I have to find him._ Slashing, tearing terror. _Booth,_ she thought in an adrenaline-fueled fog. _He's alone. Lappin's out there … I have to go._

Out the door, back into the larger sorting area, darkness enclosed her, limited her to her own fears and imagined threats. She listened, trying to hear over her throbbing pulse and the hiss of blood thundering behind her ears. A faint scuffle changed her direction to the left. Arms outstretched, her hand with the penlight balanced the hand holding his pistol as she moved and fought the queasy fear with every step.

_Where are you, where are you_. Brennan felt like she might faint as she disobeyed Booth's command and followed him. Every breath, every step wracked her body with the tension of terror. _Booth is going to kill me_, she suddenly realized, because he'd told her to stay and she hadn't and what if Lappin was behind her? She glanced behind her, helpless to prevent paranoia when every whisper of sound seemed magnified in the dark.

Sensing something off to her right, Brennan reacted with a gasp as a loud clang! startled her into nearly dropping the gun.

_Where, __**where?!**_ She pivoted again, swallowing nausea. Loud sounds of conflict guided her: grunting, a body slamming into metal. Another clang.

_Booth, no. Booth! No, Booth…._ Her brain had set itself into a repeating loop and she stepped around a large machine to see a shadow of a man raising something to bring it down and Booth was on the floor and his arm, something was wrong with his arm, and the shadow moved and started to lunge and she squeezed and breathed and a sound like a blast bucked the gun in her hands and the shadow jolted and froze and fell and she gasped again.

_Oh God, oh God. Booth. Oh God._

He was rolling on the ground, grabbing for the injured arm and groaning.

She breathed, fighting back the onslaught, trying to stay rational and assess the situation. But she couldn't, oh she couldn't think of anything but was he okay.

Booth's brain seemed more in the moment than hers was, crystallizing necessity by dint of training and the clarity of pain. He grunted out the question, the second most important question that she hadn't thought to ask. "Is he dead?"

Brennan blinked, incapable of answering.

Booth groaned and sat up to check. Blood dribbled from Lappin's mouth, revealing Brennan's expert shot had pierced his spine, heart and esophagus, in the dead center of his chest. A perfect shot on the shooting range but this was not a paper target. It bled and flopped and stared through sightless eyes as the brain died.

"Yeah, he's dead," Booth confirmed and dropped backwards in an agony of bruised ribs and broken bones.

Brennan was creeping closer, her gun still pointing, her eyes wide and wild. She saw the front of Lappin, the staring eyes and blood and her arms fell limply to her sides as reality slammed into her.

"I had to," she gasped. _I had to follow you, Booth, I had to._ "I had to shoot him." He was going to kill Booth. He was, he was.

"Yeah," Booth grunted. "I'm glad you did."

She stood still and dazed, not moving, not comprehending. Glancing over at her, Booth recognized the shock and knew she wasn't okay.

"Bones," he called. She flinched and came closer, still not fully present. "Bones, come here. I need you."

That seemed to reach her at last. Dropping to her knees, she met his concerned eyes with her own half-blank stare. "Booth..." Nothing else came out, everything she felt was now tangled up in a Gordian knot that was too large and complicated to come out.

Muffling an almost unmanly moan as he struggled to sit up again, Booth reached cautiously for the gun and removed it from her limp fingers. "Hey, look at me. Bones."

"I had to," she murmured, her bleak expression giving way to burgeoning horror.

He used his left hand, still undamaged, to turn her face to his. "It's okay. You did the right thing."

"I killed him," she whispered.

"He was going to kill me, then you. And Helen. Okay? You saved us."

"I didn't stay. You told me to stay."

Tears had started pooling at the edges of her eyes, making him groan with guilt. "You know what? I'm really glad you didn't listen to me. I'd be dead if you had."

Booth, dead? The first sob caught her by the throat, pressed out of her by the knot that wanted to escape her chest. The knot pushed it all upwards like a geyser, pouring out a torrent of tears and gasps and when his healthy right arm gathered her close she buried her face against his shoulder to stem the flow.

"It's okay," he soothed and rocked her like a frightened child. But inwardly, he was cursing himself. It was his fault Epps had targeted her, his fault she had to shoot and kill a man because she shouldn't have been in here. His fault she was suffering the harsh consequences. She'd never been trained for this. She shouldn't have been here at all.

This was why he hated having a solid, dependable partner; hated how much he depended on her and how much it was going to cost her that he couldn't send her away even when he knew he should.

~Q~

Brennan was waiting for him when he walked out of the emergency room wearing a cast. "Helen is okay. Her ankles are damaged from hanging, but otherwise she's fine. Her family is with her."

"Good." Booth stopped next to her, searching her eyes for traces of the emotional mayhem he'd witnessed earlier. "How about you?"

"I'm fine. I don't have any broken bones," she deflected.

He sighed, looking down at his casted wrist with a grunt. "This is nothing. You know I've suffered worse."

"I know," she agreed softly. For her, he had suffered worse. Brennan bit her lip and crossed her arms awkwardly because there were so many things she wanted to say and yet she didn't know where to begin. Feeling his concerned gaze upon her once more, she looked up and met him eye to eye, words unspoken passing between them.

"Let's get out of here," he suggested.

"I want to tell Epps," she said abruptly.

"No way, Bones. I'm not letting you anywhere near that bastard." There was always more to Epps than met the eye and Brennan, for all her intelligence, was naive enough not to realize the risk of letting that man speak to her. Howard Epps had done enough damage already.

"_Letting_ me?" Eyes narrowed into silver threads, Brennan refused to back down from what she felt she'd earned. "I'm the one he wanted to find her and I did." Which meant she'd won and that gave her the right to gloat. In person.

_Okay,_ Booth chided himself, _that was a poor choice of words._ The determined clench of her jaw was more than his gut instincts could combat. Brennan demanded proof and all he had was a very bad feeling. "Bones, please, just trust my gut on this."

Neither one of them should go and give Epps another shot at them. Booth's instincts were screaming, but Brennan was going in and he was her partner. So in they went together, to beard the psycho in in his prison cell.

~Q~

Epps was waiting for them in the conference chamber when they arrived, despite the late hour and a less-than-thrilled warden who had hastily arranged the late interview. Brennan crossed her arms and faced Epps like a glacier, her eyes and posture frozen with contempt. "We found her; she's alive."

He looked impressed, leaning back and offering feigned satisfaction. "Well done. Really."

"Game's over, Howie," Booth announced flatly, ready to yank his partner away at the tiniest blink or breath of misbehavior on Epps's part.

"Yes," he agreed easily. "I won."

Brennan sat down in front of him, her face betraying nothing but subdued triumph because she'd followed the clues and found the victims and Helen Majors would be going home to her family tomorrow morning. "Only if you wanted your accomplice dead."

Cocking his head sideways with curiosity, Epps inquired, "Lappin's dead?"

"Shot resisting arrest," Booth confirmed.

"Who shot him?" He glanced between them both and took in the evidence of Agent Booth sporting a new cast over his left wrist. Oh, yes, this was easy to deduce. If Booth was injured then that left Brennan. Studying her, his eyes dilated with pleasure. "It was you, wasn't it."

She returned his gaze with her own steady and impassive mask that, to most people, revealed very little. But Epps was not most people and he knew, from the way Booth shifted his weight and oozed worry, from the way Brennan was keeping a tight lid on her emotions, he knew that he had it right.

"You shot him. Did he take long to die?" Still, she stared at him stoically, as was her way. He probed her, searching for the way in, searching for the perfect puncture to penetrate her so the violation could begin. "Did he suffer?"

At this, Brennan's gaze dropped involuntarily. Lappin had died almost instantly, his heart and spine severed. Helen had suffered more, and so had Booth who had declined pain medications so he could be fully present for this interview. Part of her wished Lappin had suffered more, had felt the pain and terror he'd inflicted on Helen and Sarah, on their families. On Booth. It should have hurt him more, she thought fiercely.

Epps saw it, knew he'd entered in.

They didn't know what his goal was, he thought with immense satisfaction. They didn't have any idea. Lappin's death was exactly what he had foreseen, but not at Brennan's hand. Booth, the killer, hadn't killed this time. His partner had, losing her innocence in the bargain and Howard Epps felt an erotic surge at the notion. "This is better than I hoped," he crowed, flicking his eyes up to Booth to finally reveal what he'd intended. "I thought it would be you."

Shifting forward, Booth held silent and wary. He recalled what Epps had hissed at him once last year. _"I'm not a killer like you, the sniper."_

Now Epps shifted his oily attention to Brennan, forcing himself in deeper, forcing her to acknowledge just how much she'd given up to him and she didn't even know it. "How did it feel? Dirty, yes?" Dirty like him, like all women were. No such thing as an innocent, no matter how much she tried to hold onto it he would take it from her.

"But there's also a rush," he told her, feeling the thrill of it swelling in his prison-issue uniform. He drew the sounds out, seeking pleasure just from the orgasmic syllables of the word itself. "Pleasure."

Brennan held still, listening, revealing nothing even when Epps leaned in to accuse slickly, "Part of you _liked_ it."

He imagined the blood, the way it felt to have a life under his control, (his to allow or his to end), and oh the power it gave him to take the best and brightest women out of the world. To soil them. To soil her, taint her, take her down into the mud with him.

Brennan was still completely frozen, but at this, finally, she spoke. Finally, she understood what Epps's objective had been all along, what he'd planned for Booth and she had fallen into the trap instead. "This whole game, was to have us kill someone?"

"Who's going to tell Lappin's mom?" Epps crooned with mock compassion, knowing exactly how to use her innate empathy against her. He knew exactly how deep he could go. "She loves him very much, you know. Without her son she'll be completely alone in this sad world."

_Shit!_ Booth sensed Brennan stiffen, sensed the doubt and guilt creeping in to eat her alive as Epps thrust himself more deeply into her head, mentally raping her. Epps was stealing her innocence and _damn it!_ he should have listened to the instinct that had screamed at him not to bring her here. "We're done with you. You're never going to see us again." Feeling like he just might vomit, Booth reached for her elbow, pulling her up and out with a vow that nothing on this earth would ever put Brennan near Epps again as long as he drew breath. "Come on."

He pushed Brennan in front, guarding her with his own broad back as he swept her out the door.

Epps looked up at Booth coldly. "I'm pretty sure you're wrong about that, Agent Booth."

The door slammed shut. He dragged her down the corridor, feeling Epps's cold eyes follow them through the observation glass until they rounded a corner out of sight. "Shit! Don't listen to him, Bones. God, just forget every damn thing he said to you."

Stumbling alongside, Brennan shook free of his iron grip and the furious pace he was setting. "Booth, he wanted you to kill Lappin. He ... he wanted to make you feel guilty." The full plan unfurled in her mind as she recalled Booth's lingering guilt over having been a sniper, and Epps _knew_ and he'd set this entire plan up to torture them both. Shaking, she fell back against a wall and realized neither one of them had stood a chance.

"Lappin deserved to die," Booth growled.

"But you don't deserve to feel guilty over it," she whispered. She was the one carrying the burden and not him. Brennan steadied herself, preparing to take her first steps with the full measure of guilt she'd saved him from.

Tenderly he brushed a tangle of hair off her shoulder, as if clearing a place. "Neither do you."

"It's my fault," she declared finally, accepting the blame for everything. "I shouldn't have made you call."

Confused, Booth gently ushered her forward again so they could both get the hell away from this place. "Made me call...?"

"He was going to be executed. He would be dead if I hadn't let my ideals run away with me when I insisted those girls needed justice. They were already dead, Booth. If I hadn't forced you to call off the execution, none of this would have happened."

"No," he said sharply, bringing her back to a halt because this had to stop. He held her eyes and forced her to listen. "Don't you let him screw with your head like that. Those ideals are what make you an amazing human being and him nothing but trash. You are not a killer, Bones. Don't let him make you think you are, or that you're even capable of it."

"But I am," she reasoned bleakly. "I killed that man and I want Epps dead."

"This guilt that you're feeling is proof that you're nothing like him. You cried over the death of a murderer. Do you think Epps ever cried over any of the girls he killed?"

They were alone in the corridor, an eerie silence surrounding them. Was this feeling that sickened her proof that she wasn't evil? It was horrible, nauseating, almost dizzying, her skin crawling with regrets. Looking into Booth's steady and worried eyes, she begged for more proof because she knew he was a good man. "Did you cry?"

Falling into her brilliant light, he admitted it, what he had never told anyone but his priest. "Yes. I cried after every single one."

~Q~

He knew she wouldn't go home, knew she would sit and stew on Epps's taunts unless someone intervened and kept pointing out how necessary her actions had been. Finding her alone in the loft at her lab was no surprise, and unfortunately, finding her fighting off despair was no surprise either. When his pep talk didn't seem to be working as well as he'd hoped, Booth dug into his pocket for the proof that he always listened to her, even when they were both angry.

"I got something for ya."

"A bottle of hard liquor?" she asked cynically, referencing his earlier lecture on the proper technique for getting drunk after a hard day at work.

"The next best thing." He leaned in close, lifting a small plastic pig towards her. "Meet … Jasper."

Booth smiled at her, the flirtiest, most charming smile he'd ever conjured, as he flicked his eyes from Jasper to her. He knew he had hit her with the perfect (spontaneous) token of affection at a moment when she most needed it. There was no way to squintify this into a social contract obligation or whatever she'd called Christmas and birthday gifts. She would have to accept that _this_ gift came from his heart.

And exactly as he'd hoped the gift connected with Brennan, who was impressed with the effort. He remembered that she'd told him true gifts should be spontaneous and freely given, he'd even remembered what she would name her hypothetical pet pig. Nothing had ever lifted her spirits as much as this simple toy. The urge to cry took an entirely different turn as she took it from his hand, sighing out how much she appreciated him. "Oh..."

"You're going to be okay," he assured her.

Her question almost sounded childish from the uncertainty she couldn't hide. "Yeah?"

She looked back up at him, connecting them with one of those intense gazes where whole conversations occurred in the spaces between them.

"Definitely."

"Thank you," she breathed out quietly as she clutched the pig tightly in her palm.

"For what?"

"For letting me be your partner." Because if he hadn't, she would be crying over his loss, instead of his gift to her.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: I'm not going to promise this Friday for the next chapter. Instead, I'll say loosely in a week, give or take a few days. Meanwhile, I hope you enjoyed this one. It was very challenging (sickening) to get inside of Epps's head. I don't know how those FBI Profilers do it.


	23. The Dance in the Dark

Author's Note: Things are getting even more confusing for Brennan and Booth. The boundaries of partnership, friendship and romance are getting ever more blurry and it doesn't help that Brennan ends up in one risky situation after another. And Booth is blaming himself for her mishaps.

* * *

~Q~

~The Dance in the Dark~

~Q~

**The course of true love never did run smooth;  
But, ... if there were a sympathy in choice,  
War, death, or sickness, did lay siege to it.**

_A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 1, Scene I, Lines 136-143_

~Q~

He pulled, still breathing hard from his headlong dash down the slippery scree slope and his race against time and wind, eyes burning not to blink and lose that last wisp of dust that marked his hope. _Don't lose it, don't lose it._ On his knees, hands plunging, searching, _God please!_ and then he felt it, felt _her_. It was her, he knew it from the electricity of her touch, her hand in his, and he was pulling, _pulling_.

Born of the dusty earth, she emerged like a newborn, covered in soil and gasping her first breaths, too weak to move yet. "Hodgins! Get Hodgins," she gasped. Everyone else had joined them, digging for their other friend and when Hodgins had come up, groaning and wounded, Angela fell on him with a passionate kiss.

Brennan watched her friends kissing, smiling for a moment, because she knew Hodgins was in love with Angela ('over the moon,' which must mean he felt intoxicated because 'high' means intoxicated and the moon is very high indeed). Booth scuttled over to her, his eyes on her and she laughed, swept up in the euphoria of a hypothesis upheld. _You have a lot of faith in Booth,_ Hodgins had said. She had denied it. Not faith, _certainty_. She'd seen what he could do.

Faith is hope coupled with belief when evidence is lacking but she had evidence. She had the experience of past actions and Booth had proven himself again, come through the dust to bring her out of darkness just as all of her earlier observations had showed him capable of doing. It's what she had written in her letter.

_Booth,_  
_It's not your fault. I know you're going to find me; I just don't know when._  
_It's like falling asleep. Every night when I fall asleep, I know I'm going to see you when I wake up._  
_It doesn't hurt and I'm not afraid. I fall asleep thinking of you._  
_Your Bones_

Booth found her. And now he was here, laughing with her.

~Q~

Angela cornered him in the waiting area just outside of the emergency room, eyes hard. "Look, I'm not going to give anything away here because it's not my place."

He started to protest, misunderstanding, and she interrupted.

"What you do and who you do it with is your business." She flicked her gaze pointedly at Cam before continuing. "I don't care about that. What I'm telling you is that you can _not_ leave Brennan alone tonight."

"I wasn't planning to."

"Good. She was locked up in the dark. Neither one of them should be alone."

He looked doubtful, not sure Brennan would be that deeply affected. It was his own desire to protect her that impelled him to stay near. Angela sighed in exasperation. "She didn't tell you about El Salvador, did she." After waiting a beat for confirmation, she shook her head and gave something away after all. "Today wasn't the first time Brennan's been locked in the dark. It's not the second time either."

Horror flickered behind his guarded eyes. They'd never talked about it, aside from his guess that she'd been subjected to violence somehow but what Angela was saying made him a little bit sick.

"Yeah. Do not leave her alone." Pressing a key into his hand, Angela turned and left to check on Hodgins.

So he drove her home, overriding her arguments with the irrefutable fact that her car was still in the Jeffersonian parking lot and her purse was in evidence, and that left her stranded for the night. Brennan growled and sank back in the SUV with a scowl, arms crossed and jaw firmly clamped shut.

The battle started all over again when he tried to follow her to her apartment but he simply ignored her; walked right past her as if he hadn't heard a thing and used Angela's spare key to unlock her door (because her own key was still in her purse, which was in evidence at the FBI). And she glared at him as if he'd plotted this.

"Come on, Bones," he chuckled. "I'm not that good."

"I don't require your alpha male presence, Booth. I'm perfectly safe in here."

"I'd feel better if you'd let me stay."

"Why? It's not your fault he snatched me."

Glancing away, he knew she was going to see it. Brennan was getting better at reading expressions, or at least she was better at reading _his_ expressions, and she was going to see the nerve she'd accidentally struck start twitching. He was with Cam when the Gravedigger snatched her.

"It's not your fault," she repeated.

She was working with him, his partner, and it couldn't possibly be a coincidence that the day after brilliant forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan started to examine the Gravedigger's corpses, the Gravedigger staged a kidnapping. It couldn't be a coincidence. Which meant that it _was_ his fault. His failure to keep his own vow to protect her.

"Booth."

"What, Bones." He forced himself to meet her eyes, shadowed with exhaustion and concern. Angela had to prod him, yet now when Brennan was resisting and seemed poised to shut him out, Booth needed her to let him in. It was hitting him finally, how close he'd come to losing her. It was going to hit her, too; he needed to be with her when it did.

She must have sensed how important it was to him in their silent exchange, the ones that happened so frequently now. She sighed, briefly dropping her gaze in surrender. "You know I still don't have a TV."

"We can listen to music."

"As long as it's not Foreigner," she quipped. Then her eyes flew up to his.

Smiling, he pulled her against him in a half-embrace as he walked her deeper into her apartment and kicked the door shut behind them. "That wasn't your fault. So, why don't you go get cleaned up and I'll call in an order for Thai?"

Slipping free, she paused at her bedroom door. "Are you ordering Thai because you're avoiding my refrigerator?"

He held her eyes, one corner of his lips quirking. "Are you messing with me, Bones?"

A brighter light danced in her gaze. "You know I don't do that."

"But you do have a tendency to surprise me."

She smirked and vanished behind the closing door.

When she came out of her room thirty minutes later, washed and dressed in yoga pants and a loose shirt, the scent of fresh food and the guitars of Foreigner greeted her. Booth turned and smiled, "I ordered you red curry and pad woon sen."

Brennan halted at the edge of her kitchen counter, listening to the beginning bars of _Hot Blooded_ with more trepidation than was rational given the circumstances. Why did he play this? Where had he even found that album? He was watching her expectantly, a remote in hand.

"Dance with me," Booth offered, coming close.

Her heart was thundering in her throat. "I … I'm not in the mood."

"You weren't then, either. You didn't want me to stay."

"Yes I did," she said too quickly to have thought it all the way through. Then she flushed and shrugged.

The cocky grin was irresistible and he knew it. Taking her hand, he pulled her closer, opting for a slower dance instead of the arena rock session they'd mimed the first time. "A wise man once told me, when you fall, you have to get back on the bicycle."

"I think the proper saying is to get back on the horse," she corrected.

Chuckling, he tickled her lightly under her arm just enough to make her shriek and twitch while he heaved a long-suffering sigh. "Okay, Miss Pedantic. It was my grandfather and I was six years old. I fell off my bicycle, so he adapted the saying. The _point_ … is that we have to face what scares us."

"Are you afraid of Foreigner?" she wondered. She hadn't touched the _Records_ album since that night, except to put it away and to bring it with her when she moved.

"Are you?"

Brennan shook her head. "It's just a song."

"It's _our_ song."

"We have a song?"

"Every couple has a song."

"We aren't a couple."

"Yes, we are." He held her eyes and moved them slowly together, leading her gracefully because for once, she was letting someone else lead and he knew it meant she trusted him. "We're a couple of passionate people with some scary things in our pasts, terrible things, and one of them is this song. I think we both need to take those things back, to make them ours."

Brennan nodded, relaxing even more into him.

He grinned, charming her intentionally. "So … this is our song. And when it's finished I'm going to open your fridge over there and get myself something to drink."

"Okay," she agreed with a small shiver.

"And tonight," he stopped moving, capturing her eyes again. "Tonight we're going to turn off the lights and you're going to sleep with me beside you. You're going to take back the dark, because you'll know I'm there and nothing's going to happen to you."

"So the night is ours?"

He knew she probably wasn't aware of the metaphor, but that's what he told himself. Tonight was theirs, and just like that night a year ago when she'd damn near died, he needed to reassure himself she was still there. He just needed to be with her.

Finally the song ended and instead of ending their dance he twirled her out and pulled her back into his arms as the next track started. The airy strains of a synthesizer filling the room made her abruptly stop and look confused. "That should have been the last song."

Laughing, he swept her along again, not letting her go. "Your CD player has a 'random' setting. You should try it sometime."

"I don't like surprises," she said solemnly. The first tinkling strikes of cymbals alerted her to the song they were dancing to, _Waiting for a Girl Like You_.

She looked up at him, feeling a message in the music and the way he was watching her made her heart race. His eyes were dark, intense, and his voice rumbled so low she almost felt it instead of hearing it. "You in my arms when this song comes on … that's not a surprise. It's fate."

"There's no such thing as fate," she whispered, but a little less sure of herself than the last time she'd told him that.

"Yeah there is, Bones. This is how that night should have ended: us dancing to this song, and the two of us ending up in bed together."

Her beautiful eyes had gone very wide. He knew he'd shocked her; he had even shocked himself. Because in that moment, neither one of them was sure which night he was talking about.

It must be fate for them to keep missing each other, he thought with a trace of regret. First there was too damn much Tequila and the next time she was setting up a date with David, and this time he sort of had Cam to consider. So he pulled his partner in closer, so close he couldn't see her eyes anymore and she rested her head on his shoulder while they drifted together.

And it was a good thing he couldn't see her when looking into her eyes only made him distinctly unable to resist his rash desire to kiss her again. It didn't help that he already knew how good it would be, how potent her kiss was. He could feel how well they fit together, her soft curves and height matching him perfectly, could feel her small sigh as she relaxed and nestled in. The music swelled around them, the lyrics taunting Booth with the fact that he finally had the right woman in his arms, but he wasn't able to do anything about it except to remember their one dazzling kiss and try to survive four minutes of heaven without trying to fully recapture one of those two nights when it should have ended like this.

And there was nothing he could do but pay heed when _Dirty White Boy_ heralded their inevitable separation. He released her and she stepped back quickly. Booth actually glared up at the ceiling and questioned God's rather demented sense of musical communication because if he and Cam had a song, it was undoubtedly _that_ song. "Yeah, all right, I got it," he muttered.

"What did you get?" Brennan was half way to the kitchen, regarding him curiously. The same damn awkward pause, when God or fate or unspeakable devilment reminded him that someone else was standing in between them.

"I got the drinks. I'll get the drinks. You got any beer?"

"In the fridge," she reminded him.

Tempting fate. Booth closed his eyes and opened the door. Nothing happened. He let his breath go, grabbed the beer, then turned to his partner. "Hey, Bones, what do you say we change the CD?"

He sure as hell didn't need to be tempted by _I Want to Know What Love Is_. It was bad enough that he already knew how good they would be together.

~Q~

In the black she thrashed against confined space, arms flailing and tangling in something like ropes, ragged gasps tearing from her mouth and then she felt strong hands pulling her up.

"Bones! Hey, you're okay. I'm right here."

Flinching, she jerked away and drew her knees up, while she panted and tried to orient herself. It was still dark, but she sensed him beside her. "Booth?"

His hand again, sliding gently down her back. "I'm here."

Pressing her forehead against her knees, she shuddered, letting the terrors subside. He asked if she wanted to talk about it. "No."

"It might make you feel better," he tried.

"I didn't dream about that car ... the car." Stumbling over her near confession, she tightened herself further into a ball. "Hodgins was there." There was a light, a dome light. And she could move, and none of her bones were broken, and she had an education. And water. And there was Hodgins: she'd had to hold herself together for him, which had been remarkably helpful.

"What car." He'd heard it.

"I didn't dream about being in the car," she asserted fiercely. It wasn't the worst thing she'd ever been through, not even close.

"El Salvador?" He felt her tense under his palm, her body going rigid.

But all she said was, "I'm sorry I woke you."

Offer up something of yourself, he'd advised her once. So he did. "You didn't. You're not the only one having nightmares tonight."

Brennan straightened up slowly, turning to see his silhouette in the dark. His eyes glinted like tiny sparks in the black, and she followed their light like a moth seeking the sun. She heard him swallow before he spoke.

"I keep seeing that wide open pit of gravel. It's huge, and there's nothing that leads me to you. You're so close and I can't reach you and I know you're ... you're dying. You're already dead."

She exhaled slowly, hearing the anguish in him, and it opened her heart to reveal what she hadn't admitted yet, what she'd feared then and had dreamed tonight. "I thought you were dying when I shot Lappin."

Neither of them was sure who started it. One of them sighed and the other moved and then somehow they were lying tangled together, arms banding, legs threaded, faces pressed into richly scented throats. She breathed in deeply, soothed by his nearness, by the leaping pulse only millimeters from her lips and she gave into the impulse to push her lips against his warm skin. To kiss the life in him.

He groaned, tensing his entire body when her lips brushed up the column of his throat. _God, why now?_ he demanded helplessly. _I can't. I shouldn't. I won't be able to stop._ And he pulled her head back, desperate to stop them. "Bones..."

"Just once," she breathed, her mouth so close to his he could feel the heat, could taste her breath.

It was her breath that stole him, the need to capture it, to prove she was breathing. He closed that tiny space, enclosing their breaths in the span between his mouth and hers, in the join of sealed lips and gently probing tongues. It went on forever, leisurely breathing each other's air, their bodies moving and clinging together only as long as their mouths held the seal.

Seals break, eventually, and they broke and separated and gazed blindly at shadows of themselves. "Just once," he said. He reached for her, traced a finger over her lower lip and then withdrew.

"Booth."

Almost dreading what she was going to say, he tensed as he asked, "What, Bones?"

"You don't have to stay."

He knew she was trying to give him a graceful exit, a way to avoid temptation. That was why it was so easy for him to say, "I'm not leaving you." Gathering her into his arms, they fell asleep tangled together and slept until morning.

~Q~

Neither of them said anything about it the next day. They woke and he took her to his church and they went back to work as if nothing had happened.

It was just once.

For Booth it was something to feel guilty over and for Brennan it was something to feel hopeful about ... until she saw Booth secretly holding Cam's hand only a couple of weeks later.

That upended everything she'd thought she was beginning to understand so she spent the next few hours examining and clarifying her interactions with Booth. The rule about not dating consultants was not ironclad, rather it was unequally enforced; the smoldering gazes, charming smiles and tender touches did not convey romantic interest, only friendly concern; the protectiveness and seeming devotion was a 'partners' thing, not an alpha male protecting his mate kind of thing. Brennan saw that she had been misreading all of those behaviors, but now perhaps she had them clearly defined.

So she would adjust her expectations accordingly.

Her utter faith in Booth's honesty and integrity had also taken a blow when she realized he'd held back rather vital information (both personally and professionally) which in turn may have caused her to unwittingly violate her own ethical code. Her work partner dating her boss was a matter of professional concern but what really hurt was how foolish she felt. How long had it gone on? Did it hurt more to think he had started something with Cam after that night when they'd danced and kissed and literally slept together? Or did it hurt worse to think they'd done all those things while he was hiding an established romantic relationship with her boss.

"Sweetie, what's wrong?"

It was Angela, noticing how preoccupied she was.

Brennan hesitated to answer, knowing how irritated Booth had become the last time she'd mentioned his love life to Cam. She still wasn't clear on the distinction between gossip and concern; or in this case, gossip and her need for reassurance. If Angela didn't already know, then Brennan wasn't supposed to tell her because that was gossip, wasn't it? She bit her lip, still struggling to work out her obligation as both a slighted partner and a crushed woman.

As it turned out, she didn't have to say anything. Angela sighed and shut the door, shutting them in. "Did you figure it out?"

Liquid pain flashed in her eyes. "Figure what out?"

Cautiously, Angela suggested, "That Booth is ... involved with someone."

"With Cam." Blunt was fine, she decided, since it was now evident Angela already knew.

"Yeah."

"How long have you known?" She needed to know how deep it went, how blind she was.

And Angela winced. "A couple of months."

"I see." She nodded blindly, sucking in a deep breath to steady herself. "How did you discover it?"

"Well, Hodgins and I, we both figured it out independently..." she trailed off, noticing how Brennan had almost flinched.

"Dr. Hodgins knows also?" Brennan sank back into her chair, eyes closed as humiliation chased the tail of heartbreak. Was she the only one who didn't know? She didn't think she could avoid crying for much longer and wished Angela would leave so she could get it over with.

"Bren?"

"I don't like this feeling," Brennan said.

Settling down in a chair opposite Brennan, Angela asked, "Which feeling?"

She was referring to the extremely unpleasant physical sensations resulting from an assortment of confusing emotional surges. She didn't like the pressure in her chest, the tightening in her throat that thickened her voice; she didn't like the burning sting in her eyes, the ticklish drip of tears. She didn't like the burn of embarrassment in her cheeks, or the irrational desire to hide her face. She didn't like feeling foolish, shut-out, misled. Hopeless. Lacking.

All she said was, "I don't like being alone."

So when Will Hastings called her and asked to meet for coffee, she said yes.

~Q~

All day she'd been giving him hurt little glances but when she announced she was having coffee with Will Hastings (a potential suspect, Booth objected), that's when she confronted him. "People need connections, even me. Obviously, you have one with Cam…."

And Angela was with Hodgins now. And Brennan knew that left her alone at a time when she was trying to find her own connection.

Now that it was finally revealed, he actually felt a bit relieved; but the relief was exceedingly short-lived. Keeping her voice casual, she called him out. "I thought you would mention it. I mean, isn't that what partners do, tell each other about their lives?"

He heard: You might have mentioned you were dating my boss. You might have mentioned it when you looked in my eyes and told me I'm structured very well. You might have mentioned it when we were slow dancing to a love song. You might have mentioned it when we spent the night wrapped up in each other's arms.

Then she slid the knife in deep, remarking she'd forgotten his typical discomfort in talking about sex. The subtext of that night only a few weeks ago made him just a little queasy. _It was only a kiss,_ he thought defensively. But he knew it might have been more than that and that had she known about Cam, Brennan never would have initiated it. She wouldn't have let him stay the night at all.

From there it only got worse as his guilt magnified and made him irritable and Brennan, with all that pain to hide, resorted to teasing him. While discussing a victim who had juggled multiple girls, Booth wondered aloud what would happen if one of the girls had caught on. Distantly, not willing to let him realize he was currently witnessing her live demonstration of how a _rational_ woman handled it, Brennan pointed out, "I don't know, that's more your territory."

"What," he retorted, "am I cheating?"

"I just meant that you use psychology." Her cool grey eyes lifted to his, faintly amused. "My you're touchy, perhaps because of all your skulking around."

"I am discreet, okay? A gentleman is discreet," he insisted.

And those eyes hit him again, tiny slices. Discreet is just another word for deception.

But then Booth speculated a jilted girl might "go O-Jay" and huffed a laugh. "When a woman finds out a man has been cheating on her, she can get pretty _mad_." Brennan's flashing silver eyes lifted, stabbing him like a blade. Pretty mad? Brennan's calm, rational version of 'going O-Jay' arrived in the form of silent cuts with her glassine gaze. "It's what I heard," he added quickly, feeling each sting every time she looked at him and _said_ nothing.

He wasn't sure which woman he'd wronged, which only made his need to come up with a valid excuse all the more urgent. Cam didn't know about that night, Brennan did. But he'd hidden his relationship with Cam from Brennan, and he could tell she was hurt even though she still hadn't said anything. He couldn't stop worrying about what Brennan thought, which was making him snap at everyone. When she gazed at him disapprovingly for mocking a fellow officer about being scared of the dark, he even snapped at _her_. "What! He was being a _baby_!"

"I didn't say anything." She'd only given him those eyes, slicing silver-bladed eyes.

"But you're looking at me like I'm in trouble and you're a teacher." How did she do it? How did she wound him without saying a word?

Softly, the hurt carried to him. "You're very touchy lately, Booth."

It wasn't direct, she was defending someone else (who wasn't even there because the guy had cursed at him and hung up), but the tinge of sadness in her voice got to him. Glancing over, he saw a fleeting glimpse of Tempe, betrayed, and _those eyes_. He sighed. "Look, Bones, I don't know why I didn't tell you about Cam."

The wall went up fast. "Did I mention Cam?" Was it _her_ fault he'd been deceptive and now felt guilty about it? Was that why he was growling and snarling at everyone?

Knowing it would be inadequate, Booth attempted to explain anyway. Anything to get that hurt look out of her eyes. "I just didn't want it to get weird."

Incredulous, she repeated, "Weird?" How was it not weird _now_, she wondered. Had he not tried to avoid 'awkwardness' by substituting deception and secrets for honesty and openness, things wouldn't be so 'weird' now.

He heard the dismay in her question. "We're partners, together all the time. You're a _woman_ and I'm a man. I never had a relationship like this where we were … like two guys. Except you're not, you know, a guy."

Obviously. Now struggling to understand him, Brennan asked slowly, "Should I feel odd about wanting to hang out with Will?"

"No! Of course not, because, essentially, you're a guy, like me. But not really." _Yeah, right._ He sighed, knowing he wasn't fooling anyone.

Even she knew it was ridiculous. "That would mean, to me, that you're essentially a woman. Yeah, I can understand that."

"I would prefer not to be a woman if you don't mind."

Innocently, she shrugged. "I'm merely trying to follow your reasoning, Booth."

~Q~

She told herself she didn't accept Will's second invitation just because she'd learned her partner was dangling her along. Hanging her along. Hanging her up to dry. They had something in common: lost parents at an early age. Will had done something noble when his parents died unexpectedly, he'd dropped out of college to care for his younger brother. He was tall, well proportioned, and gainfully employed as a fire fighter. Brennan sat close to Will, enjoying his easy companionship, their conversation growing gradually smoother as their comfort with each other grew. He told her she was beautiful, kissed her in candlelight, in public. He wasn't discreet because he had nothing to hide.

But Booth came and proved her foolishness was quite extensive. Will's confession began slowly, starting with helping his younger brother terrify a girl into insanity, but that built into a confession that he'd argued with and killed his brother, which in turn led to the confession of cutting off Graham's head (but the ghost witch made him do it, so really, that part wasn't his fault). He wasn't supposed to tell about the witch. Shhh! And by the time he had confessed everything, still pleading with Brennan as if he remained a viable dating candidate, Brennan accepted her second defeat in as many days.

"What are you waiting for, Booth?" The tear streaked down, dangling from her jaw that closed over all the questions she couldn't ask, all the answers she'd never find. She stood, looking at him. _What are you waiting for?_

Their eyes held. He knew what she meant, knew her question had nothing to do with arresting Will.

~Q~

When Booth caught up to her in her office, she preempted whatever he was going to say by shooting herself down. "Sure know how to pick them, don't I."

He leaned in the doorway of her refuge, trying to comfort her with cautious platitudes. "Our perceptions are always colored by what we hope, what we fear, what we love. We do the best we can."

He meant delusions. She was so easily deluded. Blinking back more tears, she knew it was a hopeless campaign. "I'm afraid my best isn't good enough. I can read _bones_, not people."

"You know, you had no trouble seeing through _me_." He finally came into the room.

When, she wondered. When had she ever seen through him? She laughed bitterly, brushing her tears away with the irony that she was only seeing through him _now_, at this very moment, when he lied to comfort her. He wasn't interested in her; her perceptions had been colored by hope, and fear, and her wish for more with him that was not returned.

Standing, she made herself busy, made herself tell her own lie. "It's a good thing I like being alone."

"You know what, Bones, you're not alone. Come on." He reached out, putting that warm hand on her back, the one she'd misread as an interested gesture.

Now she didn't know what it meant. He was with Cam but he was pulling _her_, turning her, and she couldn't take much more. "Booth…"

She'd heard a phrase once, to kill someone with kindness, and it was only tonight that the idiom made sense. It would be easier if he would simply be cruel. She could defend herself against cruelty, against blows, against betrayals. But when he gave her that charm smile, when he softened his eyes and opened his arms, how could she defend herself against that?

"You're my partner. It's a guy hug," he assured her. "Take it."

Brennan dropped her eyes, feeling the crush inside. A 'guy' hug, not to be confused with a lover's embrace. Not to be confused with the way friends held each other. Just two men, that kind of boundary. So she sighed and stepped closer.

And experienced immediately the contradictions when Booth pulled her all the way in and wrapped his large body around hers.

Heterosexual American males don't hug each other at all. She was an Anthropologist which meant she knew it was another lie. It felt so nice that she wished he would leave so she could get back to crying.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: First, while I'm not doing a 'song fic,' the first part of this chapter is set to select tunes featured in Foreigner's 1982 compilation album, '_Records_.' I decided Brennan has been hanging on to this for some reason, maybe it belonged to her parents.

Brennan has a PhD in Cultural Anthropology (mentioned in the Circus episode), which means I'm fairly certain she was never fooled by the 'guy hugs.'

As promised, the first hints of slightly AU romance begin here, and it's only slightly AU because...

Headless Witch in the Woods, another one of my favorite episodes, shows Booth getting all flustered like he was busted. How busted was he...? In the scene where Booth breaks up Brennan's date with Will, you can see poor Brennan getting crushed when she sees how badly she misjudged Will, but she also realizes how badly she's misread Booth. Remember all that flirting that's been going on in the recent episodes? Brennan asks Booth very pointedly, "What are you waiting for?" The way that she looks at him, the guilt on his face when she walks away crying.

Did something happen between them...?


	24. The Head and the Heart

Author's Note: Another sincere thank you to all you who are reading, watching, favoriting and reviewing this story. Your continued interest is what inspires me to keep writing.

The last time Brennan encountered Epps, she learned what his objective was. This time, she's not taking any chances. How do we know...? She let Booth assign her protection without an argument. She got a gun. She's carrying it around openly. And, she did _not_ tell Booth what she knew was going to happen. Let's just say, their partnership is about to get very complicated.

* * *

~Q~

~The Head and the Heart~

~Q~

******War, death, or sickness, did lay siege to [love],  
**Making it momentany as a sound,  
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream,  
Brief as the lightning in the collied night  
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,  
And ere a man hath power to say 'Behold!'  
The jaws of darkness do devour it up;  
So quick bright things come to confusion. 

_A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 1, Scene I, Lines 143-150_

~Q~

Angela handed Brennan a snapshot of an attractive man that generally fit Epps's physical attributes. "The burn victim is Donald Kent, a decorated fire fighter."

One died to save lives, the other lived to take lives. Seeing the similarity in their appearance that ended at their life's endeavors, Brennan sighed. "Epps would appreciate the irony."

"Kent was still alive when he was set on fire. How many victims does that make?" Angela's grim observation was an unwelcome reminder of what was at stake.

Brennan glanced at the bulletin board she'd set up in her office in an attempt to predict Epps's next move. All of his known victims were listed and linked according to cause of death, time of disappearance, time of discovery, last known location and location of discovery. She was not a profiler and could hazard no guess as to his motivation, but perhaps there was a clue in the raw data. A pattern.

Eyes locking on the entirety of Epps's murderous career, taking into account this latest victim, she felt again the weight of guilt. It had nagged and flared up several times over the last few months, but now it burned in her chest as caustically as untreated esophageal reflux. Over time, gastric acid could burn a hole in the delicate lining. Everything within her was fraying at the simple fact: if only she hadn't made Booth call off that execution this wouldn't be happening now. Three people were dead as a result of her ideals (four, if she counted Lappin).

To Angela she replied, "Seven, that we know of."

"And they aren't just young blonde women anymore."

Brennan dropped wearily into her seat, Angela taking a chair opposite her desk. "No," Brennan sighed sadly. "They aren't."

"He's such a monster. He's killed from behind bars, and new victims keep turning up. And now he's _out._"

"We will find him, Ange. We're ready this time." She just wouldn't play. She wouldn't speak to him or let him see her; she wouldn't let herself be drawn into his games. Tracking him from inside this lab, that was what she would do. Booth had warned her to stay in the lab, and after a grimace, she'd silently given in to his greater wisdom. If she'd listened to his instincts last time, Epps's final digs into them both wouldn't have happened. Knowing how pointless it was to keep blaming herself didn't make it any easier to stop, however.

Forcing the slight edge of fear out of her voice, Brennan met her friend's worry head on, trying to sound more assured of the outcome than she actually felt. Angela did not look reassured. It was just another sign of her unease, given the fact that Brennan had not told Angela the full depth of Epps's manipulations—she didn't know that during their last encounter he'd deliberately lured both Brennan and Booth into his psychological trap with the express intent to make them killers, like him.

_All_ of this was a direct consequence of her decision; that was a fact. So she was ready this time: she knew what Epps was capable of, she knew where her strengths lay, she knew he might come after her or Booth again. And she was ready.

"I'm not," Angela insisted. "Look, I have some sick days coming. And I was thinking that, since Epps makes me sick, that…"

She interrupted, calm and yet faintly desperate. "We need you, Ange."

Brennan's direct gaze was so hard to refuse, and then with a sly little tug at the edge of her lips Brennan added, "Hodgins certainly does."

A brow shot up, Angela's chin tipped down, an incredulous smirk gracing her features as she realized her clueless best friend had just played her. "That was _low_." But she almost laughed, almost felt a brief smear of joy to see how far Brennan had come in just a few months.

"I know," Brennan admitted unapologetically, then grinned proudly. "Did it work?"

Yes, of course it worked. Angela returned the grin broadly for a moment, recognizing progress and sisterhood. She remembered the last time they'd talked about Epps, Brennan's guilt and fear, the feeling of being controlled. Part of the reason she wanted to stay away was because she hadn't missed the faint tremors in Brennan's earlier insistence that they were ready to take on the escaped killer. She knew Brennan was afraid and just not saying anything.

"How do you deal with the fear?"

"I … have this."

Sweeping up her handbag, Brennan pulled out a handgun big enough to make Dirty Harry twitch with pistol envy. It was the largest revolver Angela had ever seen in her life and this from a woman who grew up in Texas. "Oh, my God!" Angela exclaimed. "That … that thing is _huge_! Whoa, wow. That's like … movie huge."

Booth strode in, took in the hand-canon Brennan was holding and didn't break stride until he was standing right next to her. "Where the hell did you get _that_?!"

Breezily. "The Mall."

Incredulous. "The Mall." The National Mall? Crystal City Mall? Pinkerton's Pawn Shop? Booth knew his mouth was open but the next thing she said just flummoxed him further.

"Yeah, it's pretty big, right? Bigger than the one you have." She smirked, her eyes flashing a tease that almost made Angela whoop in delight. Brennan had come a very long way indeed, tossing out innuendos like that completely ad lib.

He fell into it head first. "Excuse me, it's not the size that matters, it's how you _use_ it."

"Well, I think size … is pretty important." Another coy flick of her eyes had Booth sputtering and Angela covertly snickering.

"The point is, that you shouldn't have a gun in the first place!" He sent Brennan a barbed glare that made her raise her brows but clearly Brennan had no intention of heeding whatever message he'd tried to send.

"If you _do_ have one … bigger is always better."

Angela hadn't been able to resist joining the fun, but she knew she'd gone too far when Booth shot her a look and growled, "You're not helping."

"Right. Yeah, this does seem like a private … conversation." She left a lingering smirk in her wake.

"Yeah, private!" He grumbled to her retreating back. Booth turned to Brennan. "Okay, you know, if people see you with that thing, the next thing you know everyone in this place is gonna start packing."

Stuffing the revolver back into her purse, Brennan darted a caustic little barb right back at him. "This is America. Get used to it."

For one moment he was reluctantly amused at her playful mood. Brennan teasing and joking was a rarity of late, and it was cut far too short by her phone ringing.

"Brennan."

"I'd forgotten how nice it was to breathe nice, fresh air."

Epps. Brennan had never fully understood why people claimed 'their blood ran cold.' Notwithstanding the physiological impossibility of a sudden drop in temperature, she didn't feel cold at all. Rather, she experienced a sudden flush of heat, a sickening flare in her fingers and belly that twisted and made her twitch. Knowing it was a spike of adrenaline that sent her pulse galloping and her fingers contracting involuntarily tighter around the phone did not make the effect any less disturbing.

Gesturing to the phone and mouthing 'Epps,' Brennan watched her partner leave to trace the call. Unaccountably, she wished he would stay close by even though she knew such an impulse was irrational. With more poise than she thought possible, Brennan replied, "We will find you, Howard."

"We'll see," he shrugged. Turning to view the intersection where he'd found a payphone, Epps settled in for a pleasant conversation with the object of his interest, chatting her up like an old school chum. "I can't tell you how nice it is to be out of that stupid, orange jumpsuit. I mean, I have an IQ of 180 for God's sake, and they had me dressed like a pumpkin."

"You burned a man alive," Brennan said softly. It didn't fit the rest of the picture. She wasn't a profiler and psychology was meaningless guessing under a cover of statistics, but she couldn't help trying to understand the deviation from Epps's established pattern. A man burned alive was quite different from young women beaten and buried.

"Means to an end," he dismissed, revealing to Brennan through his lack of interest that the fireman had been mere expedience. Not for pleasure. "_Everything_ … is a means to an end, Doctor Brennan."

Cautiously, she observed, "I thought it was just women you were after." Wasn't it? Was he after _her_? Was he after Booth? She closed her eyes for the briefest of moments, reassuring herself that the gun was in reach and Booth was standing just outside her office still tracing the call. Booth was safe.

"I felt the need to grow, as a human being."

Not knowing what that meant, fear spiked higher, her adrenal glands secreting copiously under the mounting psychological strain. Did this mean he was coming after Booth? Drawing a steady breath, she controlled her voice and asked for clarification. "What is it that you want? You must want something, or you wouldn't be calling." Then she tensed herself, waiting for his answer.

Epps sounded vaguely accusing, predatory, pleased. "Yes, I want you to know … that everything that happens from here on in, is your fault."

Brennan gasped faintly, brutalized by her own swarming doubts. How did he know so precisely that guilt was the thing that would most put her on edge? She'd just told herself she wouldn't play his games, and yet here she was, getting pulled in. He wasn't going to wait for her to go to him; he was coming after her, which meant she had no choice. "What's going to happen, Howard?"

He laughed softly. "I can't answer all of your questions. Use your head, Doctor Brennan. Use your head."

The line went silent but not dead, suggesting Epps had simply walked away from a phone instead of hanging up. He wanted her to follow, he was making it easy. Booth returned a minute later with the traced number. Brennan jumped up to follow him, grabbing her bag.

"Where is the gun?" Booth held her back with a palm on her shoulder.

She glared back defiantly. "In my bag."

"Leave it here."

Sharply, she jerked away and turned for the door. "No."

He caught her wrist and loosely tugged her back around, frustrated and slightly irritated by the implied lack of trust. Hadn't they just determined a few weeks ago that he was her gun? "You don't need it."

Her eyes burned into his like a welder's arc, blinding in their intensity. "He killed a man."

"I know, Bones, but—"

"A _man_."

"It's not the same," Booth tried.

"He called me." That was what struck hard, struck deep terror into her, a glimpse of it escaping through her breathlessly expelled fact. Epps killed, wanted them to kill, killed a man. Booth wasn't any safer than she was and she was _not_ leaving him exposed. "He's going to keep coming after us until he gets what he wants."

Warily, Booth asked, "What does he want?"

"The same thing as before. He said everything is my fault." If Booth got hurt it would be her fault.

"It's not."

"It _is_!" The crack in her voice split open the façade of control even further, wide enough to expose how deeply afraid she was. This was just the beginning. Epps was playing with her, she knew it was only a matter of time (hours, perhaps) before the messages began to arrive wrapped up in body parts.

"Bones, you need to stay calm."

Fiercely, she held his gaze. "I am calm. I am going with you and I am _not_ leaving the gun. If you want to stop me, you'll have to lock me to my desk with your handcuffs." Then she raised her brows, daring him to try it.

~Q~

First there was the bone shavings. Then the heart. Next the head of Epps's wife.

Epps hit on Parker, causing Booth to pressure Cam into rushing examination of the head. The price paid for the lack of prudence was the detonation of an exploding vial of fragile glass having been imbedded in such a way that any attempt at extracting it would have resulted in a poisoning. Cam collapsed. After that, Carolyn Epps's body held the answer to the poison and knew what the head didn't say: booby traps came in pairs, just like head and heart, just like partners. Zack nearly died when he triggered a pressure switch but Booth's quick thinking saved both the kid and the cure. They had the antidote, at least. Booth sent Brennan home with two agents while he went to be with Cam.

~Q~

It was while he was chatting with Cam, explaining how they'd found the antidote, that Booth realized what the plaster dust meant. It meant Epps was close enough to Brennan to strike. As he rushed out of the hospital, he phoned in a request for a sniper to watch her apartment (shoot that bastard if he dares to go after her). At her door, he whispered to Agents Holtz and Svenson, "Check the apartment next door," before he slipped into Brennan's apartment. The front room was still, nothing out of place, and from the back bedroom he heard her shower running and mellow music playing.

On stalker's feet, he drifted slowly across the room and down the short hallway, alert to sounds coming from within the room beyond the wood barrier. As he reached for the door he heard it: the faintest of clicks.

Booth pushed open the bedroom door and found Epps standing in front of her bathroom, surprise frozen into his features, a crow bar held at an arrested angle. Whatever he was seeing had surprised him. Booth knew what it was, without even having to look. "Dead end," he said.

And when Brennan heard he was there, she sounded vaguely annoyed. "You won't let me shoot him, will you."

Keeping his eye on Epps, Booth edged nearer to his partner. She was standing in a triangle pose, that ridiculous hand-canon aimed straight at Epps and making her intention unmistakable. "You knew he was going to be here, didn't you."

They weren't asking questions, merely showing how well they understood each other. Brennan gave a verbal shrug. "It's the only scenario that made sense."

Glancing behind him, realizing he was cornered because Booth blocked both the door and his closeted point of entry, Epps backed up a few paces.

"Oh, you looking for the balcony, Howie? Hope you can fly, 'cause that's about a fifty foot drop." Booth turned to her, seeking confirmation that would dissuade any foolish effort at escape. "Right?"

"Yeah," she nodded, eyes wide because Booth was here and now she had something to fear.

Epps finally shook himself loose from his surprise, realizing she'd truly out-thought him. And Booth, as well. "How did you know?"

"Plaster dust in the poison."

And Booth added, "Renovations to the apartment next door."

Brennan smirked, finally feeling a sense of impending victory. "You're not all that smart, turns out."

Realizing that he hadn't been wrong about that trace of darkness in her, Epps eyed her with the lingering lust that had drawn him to her right from their violent introduction. "One minute. All I want is one minute alone with you."

"Fine with me," she murmured enigmatically.

Booth glared at the two of them. "Don't provoke the lunatic, all right?"

Epps raised a brow, Brennan shrugged. Both recognized Booth wasn't quite sure which lunatic he was most worried about provoking.

To Howard Epps, Booth pointed out, "You've go nowhere left to go."

"I'm not going to jail."

"Well, you see, that's really not your decision, Howie. Put your hands up." Howie did, lifting the curved hook of the crowbar high in his right hand. Booth added, "Drop the crowbar."

Instead, Epps threw the crowbar at Booth, striking a cobalt blue porcelain lamp just behind him and shattering it. As the distraction made Booth duck, Epps turned to dash for the door leading to Brennan's balcony. Booth bolted across the room.

"I'm in the line of fire," Booth hollered to Brennan, praying she didn't go off half-cocked and shoot him in the back. Out on the balcony, he saw Epps scaling the railing. Epps went over and plunged and Booth grabbed his right wrist at the last second.

As Epps slammed against the concrete decking he winced. The entire weight of his body jerked his shoulder painfully, and Booth's grip on his wrist tightened so hard his hand throbbed. He winced from the pain and the fear. Now that his descent had been halted, he had a second to form second thoughts.

Booth grunted, "You're not getting away, Howard." Death was too much of an escape.

Epps laughed, seeing his chance to leave an enemy with a lingering wound. "Look who the killer is now, Agent Booth." This was how it had all begun, with a hissed observation: _"I didn't kill anyone, unlike you, the sniper."_

"A little help here, Bones. I got nothing but dead weight."

She had just come beside him, waiting for him to pull Epps up. At this she lunged over the railing, trying to reach for Epps's hand to help pull, or at least to share the weight until help arrived. But Booth's arms and legs were longer, and Epps had pulled him so far over that Brennan couldn't get close enough. "Sorry, I can't reach," she gasped, still desperately lunging downwards.

"Grab the railing," Booth groaned, realizing Epps was making no effort to save himself.

"You're going to drop me anyway," Epps muttered with a red-faced gasp. "Just get it over with."

Glaring into Epps's cold eyes, seeing the dark gleam of triumph, Booth felt an answering spurt of hatred. "You son of a bitch," he whispered, knowing Epps heard. Knowing the killer was forcing his hand by refusing to aid his own rescue.

"Are you saying you don't want me dead," he taunted.

"I'm not you," Booth said quietly, all of his focus on holding the grip. Fighting the demon in his hand, in his heart. He didn't want Epps dead, and yet he did. Dead meant no further harm was possible. It meant she would be safe. It meant she wouldn't be the one to kill Epps, to carry another stain on her soul.

And Epps knew it. "Oh, really. You're not thinking of the world with me still in it? Going after Doctor Brennan? Your son…."

The hatred flushed through him, making his eyes burn and his hand squeeze tighter. Flashes of Brennan's head broken and bleeding strobed behind his eyes, Parker snatched from a merry-go-round. Angela crying over a cut out heart. Brennan sobbing against his shoulder over the man she'd killed. Cam gasping for air. Brennan's beautiful eyes wide open with fear as an iron bar smashed into her face. Zack's face, covered in shrapnel cuts. Brennan killing Epps.

"I'm not you," he whispered, but he wasn't sure anymore. Hatred surged and swelled, choking him. Epps was forcing his own death, refusing to help himself. Brennan would never be safe as long as he was alive, only if he died... Epps was creeping out of his grasp, his eyes turning desperate as last-second fear stole his self-possession. And Booth held frozen, unable to pull up, the tension and agony in his hand, arm and shoulder mounting to a pinnacle of pain.

Booth felt the weight in his hand slipping, sweat-slick and no matter how hard he tried to tighten his grip gravity was winning. His face contorted with the effort, Epps was sliding down, his hand shimmying through, lower, lost!

The cramping clench had numbed his hand and it held the claw-like shape even after the load vanished. Epps flailed in a futile attempt to regain the hold. As he fell, his eyes never left Booth's, the final descent marked by triumph. His body smashed into the concrete sidewalk, a puddle of blood pouring from the base of what would undoubtedly prove to be a shattered skull.

Booth sagged against the railing, and sensed Brennan beside him, her hand on his shoulder and drawing him back. On the street, Special Agent Ramirez had emerged from Brennan's building chattering excitedly into his radio but when he saw the mess, he slowed and looked up. Still speaking. Canceling the ambulance?

"Booth," she said softly. "It's what he wanted."

"What the hell are you talking about?" he snapped.

Brennan tensed but kept her hand on his biceps, curling her fingers around and turning him away from the carnage below. He glared at her, but she looked back with steady conviction. "He didn't want to go back to jail. You heard him say that, right before he tried to jump. You tried to stop him from killing himself."

Cursing, he shrugged her off and stomped back inside her bedroom. The crow bar lay on the floor next to her smashed lamp. His eye skimmed over the familiar space—the bed where he'd kissed her—and settled on the closet. He pushed his way into her closet, glaring at the large square hole Epps had cut into the sheetrock. Right here, only a few feet away from her for the last couple of nights.

Stepping through it, he found his fellow agents examining a clichéd serial killer wall of death just a few feet away from the hole. The contents featured the Jeffersonian, news articles about Brennan, photos of everyone taken with a telephoto lens. There was a flow-chart detailing connections between Brennan and her coworkers, Booth, Cam, even Parker.

In the next room a mattress rested on the floor, and a hardcover copy of Brennan's first book placed next to a worn blanket with her photo from the dust jacket folded open. Special Agent Svenson stood over the mattress, aiming an Alternate Light Source over it and staring with disgust at the ultraviolet splotches that dotted the fabric.

"The ALS indicates the presence of, um … biological evidence," Agent Svenson informed Booth carefully and avoided his anguished eyes.

Back through the hole in the wall, back into Brennan's private space, he emerged into her bedroom and found her standing at the foot of her bed. She had finally shut off the water. Her face was carefully blank, but the tone in her voice chilled him.

"He waited for me to turn on the shower."

To catch her unaware, unarmed, nude, vulnerable. To hit her with that crow bar and take the light out of her eyes, to take her light out of the world.

Invisible fingers seemed to grip him under the edge of his jaw, thrusting upwards until his mouth filled with saliva and he bolted for the toilet before it all came up on her clean hardwood floor.

When he left her bathroom fifteen minutes later, she handed him a steaming cup of scented tea. "It's ginger with honey."

"Bones, I don't drink this herbal stuff."

"It'll settle your stomach."

He sighed. His fingers twitched with barely restrained violence, with the need to _do_ something, hit something, strangle a man who could never be dead enough. Gaze skipping over the room again, over his partner's face, pale but calm, he settled on the crow bar again. His hands clenched in helpless fury.

"Come on, Special Agent Holtz needs to debrief you."

She had already turned and headed back to the kitchen. Booth followed her and faced off against two agents and a DC Metro police officer wearing identical expressions of concern and sympathy. They took his statement perfunctorily; fate had given him a break for once, in the form of law enforcement witnesses who would swear Booth had tried valiantly to save Epps from a fatal fall. None of them questioned how Epps had come to be dangling off the fifth floor balcony in the first place.

"Epps said he did not desire a return to prison prior to jumping," Brennan had explained concisely. That was all it took to satisfy the official inquiry.

"How long were you home before you realized Epps had entered your apartment?"

Brennan felt Booth's eyes on her, looked up to him and knew her answer was going to upset him further. "I knew he would be here waiting for me when I left the lab. I was home over an hour before I heard him come through my closet, because I had turned on my shower deliberately to lure him out of hiding. I was tired of waiting."

"Bones! Why didn't you call me?"

"You were with Cam."

Simple, true, and potentially fatal. His heart seized, he felt the blood draining out of his head and was glad he was sitting down. Finally seizing on the tea, he took a sip to quell the rapidly returning nausea. He'd left her alone to deal with Epps.

"Besides," she added tartly. "I was armed and waiting."

She didn't call for him. She didn't trust him to be there. Booth sputtered, "He could have caught you off guard. He could have waited until you slept! He could have killed you."

"I had it under control when you unnecessarily broke into my house," she argued bluntly.

"It's my job to protect you!"

But he was with Cam…. She didn't have to say it, his own guilty conscience beat the unforgivable lapse into him. He was with Cam, by accident or by design leaving Brennan alone and vulnerable, and Epps had rushed into the void as if he'd known where Booth would be. Because, Epps _had_ known….

Oh, God. Everything was a means to an end, that's what Brennan had repeated from the first phone call. A heart, telling Brennan that Booth was the target. A booby-trapped head, left for Brennan but opened by Cam, the pathologist who had Booth's heart. The heart was distracted, leaving the head vulnerable.

"You can't be with me every second." Unspoken was the acknowledgement that he hadn't been with her nearly as often in the last couple of weeks, since she'd discovered his relationship with Cam. He'd moved that out into the open and moved Brennan into second place. He'd sent her home alone while he went to the hospital. And she hadn't called, had planned to take Epps out on her own.

Now he knew he was going to vomit again and for once Brennan was the one reading him. "Drink the tea, Booth."

Agent Holtz shook his head, thinking there was more going on between these two than the surface argument suggested. He repeated the preliminary results of the inquiry, as if to reassure them both. "Unit on the ground saw what happened. So did the sniper across the street. You tried to save him."

"Yeah," Booth growled, his mood growing darker.

"No one could have helped him," Brennan added.

"Yup." Coldly, not meeting her eyes, Booth grabbed the tea and slugged back more.

Holtz regarded his fellow agent compassionately. "You can take off now, Booth. The department might want to assign you a shrink, an on-the-job death like that."

Booth said nothing to Holtz, who shrugged and left.

Brennan watched him sip the tea again and when he put the emptied cup down with a snap, she tried again. "You didn't have your full strength," she reasoned. "Your wrist was hurt from pulling Zack away from the explosion."

Clenched jaw, hard eyes, he glared at her. "My wrist wasn't hurt, Bones." There was no justification for wanting Epps dead and possibly not doing enough to prevent it; he wouldn't let her invent one after the fact.

She held his fury, knowing what was happening, exactly what he was doing and she'd have stopped it if Booth had arrived later by one more minute. One minute alone with Epps, exactly what he'd asked for. Shaking her head, she muttered, "I wish you'd have let me shoot him."

"No you don't," he snapped. He left so fast she stalled at her table for a moment.

Yes she _did_, damn it! Racing after him, she saw the elevator wasn't engaged and down at the end of the hallway a 'snick' alerted her to the stairwell door shutting. Hurling herself down after him, she caught him at the fourth floor. "Booth!"

He didn't stop. "Go back upstairs, Bones."

"No!" She reached for his arm, finally turning him at the third landing and pushing him back against the wall. "This is exactly what he wanted! You have nothing to feel guilty about."

"Don't I?" Shoving her backwards, he pushed away from her and paced a tight circle around her in the confined landing. "He was going to _kill_ you. It wasn't a game anymore. He was going to beat you with that crow bar, crush your skull and _kill_ you."

"I know that, Booth."

Stepping into her, pushing her backwards again, he bellowed, "Why the hell didn't you call me!"

"You sent me home, you told me to get some sleep."

"You _knew_ he was waiting here for you. God damn it, why didn't you say something?"

Her eyes flashed at him, and she answered distinctly, "because I knew you would stop me."

Absolute horror flooded him. What was she saying? What was she admitting? He stumbled backwards a step, sick as realization swept over him. She had planned to kill Epps. It would have been self defense, a sort of premeditated self defense that no one would question. "Why?" he gasped. Dear God, what had Epps done to her to make her even consider it?!

"So _this_ wouldn't happen!" She was on the verge of crying, tears eyeing a leap to her cheek and her voice shaking. "So he couldn't make you feel guilty again."

"Bones, _why_?"

A ferocity he'd only seen once before had entered her eyes. The day after she'd told him about death squads in El Salvador, he'd seen that same expression in the mirror just before he left to threaten Ortiz with murder. She would have murdered Epps to protect him, just like he may have let Epps die to protect her...

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Brennan knew Epps would be at her apartment and yet didn't tell Booth, which strongly hints she intended to face him alone and kill him. And at the table in her apartment, Booth is furious. I wonder if his guilt over leaving Brennan exposed plus Brennan's willingness to kill Epps might be part of what freaked Booth out and made him draw that line. Then there's the problem that Booth himself isn't sure he did everything in his power to save Epps.

Is it possible the line Booth drew was more about ethics than romance...?


	25. Obeying the Laws

Author's Note: This was possibly the most difficult chapter yet because of the winnowing process. As I said earlier, I've plucked out certain threads from the canon storyline and I'm weaving them into a different story, but one that feels like it might have happened this way. Maybe. ;)

In the interests of not dragging this story out forever, I'll be skipping over a lot of things so I can draw those threads tight and (hopefully) reveal the pattern that was hidden underneath. One of the things I noticed at the end of season two/early season three is how often Booth took Brennan into his interviews and interrogations, and at times he seemed to be teaching her. The thing is, they learned how to work together in the interrogation room and doesn't it seem reasonable to suspect that handy skill might prove useful in other venues...?

* * *

~Q~

~Obeying the Laws~

~Q~

**If then true lovers have ever cross'd,  
It stands as an edict in destiny.  
Then let us teach our trial patience,  
Because it is a customary cross,  
As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,  
Wishes and tears, poor fancy's followers. **

_A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 1, Scene I, Lines 152-157_

~Q~

"Why?" he gasped. Dear God, what had Epps done to her to make her even consider it?!

"So _this_ wouldn't happen!" She was on the verge of crying, tears eyeing a leap to her cheek and her voice shaking. "So he couldn't make you feel guilty again."

"Bones, _why_?"

A ferocity he'd only seen once before had entered her eyes.

~Q~

"No," he said, still so appalled it was frankly a surprise he could say anything at all. "No, God, this is _wrong_."

"I didn't do anything wrong," she insisted.

"You were going to kill him."

That fierce protectiveness morphed into outrage as the mistress of facts pointed out a key fact Booth might have overlooked. "He broke into my house. I had every right to defend myself. That's not wrong."

"_Letting_ him do it is … murder!"

"No it isn't. I have a right to be in my own home and to defend myself from an intruder. And I didn't 'let' him do anything. I came home after two days away, on your instructions that I should get some sleep. Two FBI agents searched my apartment before I entered it and they told me it was safe. If he was already in here, they'd have caught him."

Booth stared at her in dismay. "You knew he would come to your apartment. You turned on the water to lure him out."

Brennan tilted her head, regarding him with one of her assessing gazes. "That implies I received some sort of psychic vision which clearly is impossible. Besides, if he didn't show up inside my home, nothing would have happened. I did not lure him, pursue him or otherwise compel him to enter my apartment."

"Bones!" Her irrefutable reasoning left him speechless and thoroughly outmaneuvered. Having never fully been on the wrong end of Brennanite argumentation, he was left with nothing but a glare as a rebuttal.

"I don't know why you're so upset," she finally muttered. "Neither one of us killed him, he committed suicide."

"It's not about what happened, it's about what was _intended_."

"You can't prosecute intention, Booth. You can never prove intention. You can't prove I didn't intend to call for help from the agents outside my apartment just as you came in." And her glorious eyes blazed into his with that sparkling intelligence that had goaded Epps into playing his macabre game of wits with her in the first place.

Stunned, Booth shook his head and finally gave up in defeat because there was no way to outthink Temperance Brennan. Even Epps had come to that conclusion in the last moment which was probably why he'd thrown himself off the balcony. That was it, the debate was over.

With a sympathetic pat on his arm, Brennan suggested, "You should go be with Cam." And then she was gone, leaving him even more confused (a state he would have argued as impossible only minutes before).

If all of this was intended to protect him, he wasn't sure whether to be grateful or terrified at how ruthless and relentless her logic was. All he had to go on was a gut suspicion that Brennan had intended to let Epps come to her so she could shoot him in self defense, and his gut was never wrong. Yet courts and Brennan agreed nothing was certain without evidence. Logically, it wasn't a crime; emotionally, he knew it was. And he didn't know where the line was anymore that divided the two.

~Q~

So he drew one, right between them, right after he broke it off with Cam.

~Q~

**April 2007**

"You see what he did there, Bones?"

Brennan had been watching Charles Webster very carefully for the last five minutes, studying his features intensely. He had a pronounced nasal ridge, and flat zygomatic bones that suggested Asian ancestry, but Booth was undoubtedly calling her attention to the shift of Webster's eyes. When Booth asked him where he was on Friday night, he'd looked up and to the left, so she reported that to Booth.

"Up and to the left, that's right. You know what that means?"

Shifting her attention to her partner, Brennan unconsciously raised her own eyes off to her right and promptly startled a second later when Booth shouted, "Ah _ha_! You just looked to the right."

"I don't understand why you found it necessary to shout at me," she griped.

Looking into her eyes with more than a trace of cocky satisfaction, he murmured the answer only to Brennan as if Webster wasn't sitting right there, listening. "You looked right when you were trying to recall information about eye contact that I gave you last week. Webster, here, looked to the left, a sure sign of fabrication."

"That's psychology," she scoffed.

"No it's not, Bones. It's medical science: the side of the brain responsible for creativity resides on the right, and it controls the left side of the body. The site of memory retrieval is on left, and you know the left side of the brain controls the right side of the body."

Her lips stretched into a broad grin. "Science?"

"Absolutely." Booth pressed the file in front of him in Brennan's direction. "You see, Webster over there can't tell me where he really was last Friday night because he was killing his ex-girlfriend. He has to make something up, invent an alibi, and that means using his creative side, which sent his eyes ... left."

Cocking her head to the side, letting go a sly little smirk, Brennan switched her attention back to Webster. "Is that true, Mr. Webster?"

"I want a lawyer."

"Yep, definitely guilty," Booth boasted. "I always know."

"Tell me another one," she enthused.

Sparing half a glance at their uncomfortable guest, Booth shook his head. "We don't want to keep Mr. Webster waiting."

"What? He's asked for a lawyer; he's already going to be waiting."

Oh, she did have a valid point. Booth shrugged, and smiled at her eager anticipation. "Okay, here's another one: he slept."

"Last night," she suggested doubtfully.

"No, Bones, right here, in the interrogation room." Off her amused curiosity he waggled his eyebrows and then turned to waggle a finger at Webster. "Big mistake, that one. You see, an innocent person left alone will pace, fidget, and jump up to instantly insist on their innocence to anyone who will listen."

"Really..." Brennan sounded fascinated.

"Really," Booth agreed. "The guilty ones try to act all cool, like they got nothing to hide. They go to sleep. A sleepy suspect is a guilty suspect."

"Well, what if they're just tired?"

"Ah come on, Bones. If you were being questioned for murder, don't you think your adrenaline would keep you awake?"

He could see that she was really considering it, from the way her eyes got a little distant and she frowned. "But, wouldn't the stress of lying cause a larger adrenaline release than the stress of being under suspicion?"

"Hey, I don't want to give away all my secrets in front of Mr. Webster." Booth stood, scraping up the file and taking Brennan's elbow to lead her out of the room. Out in the hallway, Booth turned to her and flashed her a charm smile. "Thai after this?"

Blushing slightly, Brennan studied the ulnar styloid process of his wrist with feigned interest until he dropped her arm. Booth took her to dinner almost every night now. They rarely touched, not like they did before Sully and Cam, but his eyes often held hers and she looked forward to their evening meals with their lively debates and teasing jokes. If one of them had to work late, the other always waited. It had become another pillar of their partnership.

So she nodded. "I'll wait at the lab."

"Be there as soon as I get Webster hooked up with his lawyer," he promised. He leaned in, eyes twinkling. "And then I'll explain the sleepy suspect rule."

~Q~

There was a strain between her and Booth that ebbed and flowed after Epps and again when newly minted Dr. Zack Addy responded to a White House request for his services in Iraq. He left without telling her, leaving that grim task to her partner as a fellow man of honor. She listened carefully to Booth's explanation of duty and sacrifice, leaving labs to live life, or birds' nests to find wings, many metaphors that couldn't remove the key absence of Zack.

With Zack gone, she had to stay in the lab and work over the bones (silent now, empty remnants of osseous tissue) with the careful attention to detail they deserved. Brennan realized she hadn't fully appreciated Zack's own genius with bones until she had other potential interns to compare his superlative skills against. None of them measured up. Even when Hodgins gently counseled her to "just find someone to help out around here," she couldn't find a single acceptable choice.

She had gone deaf and blind, but she still could feel and remember more than anyone when it came to bones. Only Zack's skill had rivaled hers, which was why she refused seventeen applicants and earned Cam's exasperation in addition to Booth's desperation.

Booth lamented her absence from his side, pulling her along for lunches and dinners and sometimes even breakfasts, but never during his field work because her duty towards the bones could not be delegated to a lesser talent. The only thing that finally pulled her all the way back to Booth's side during the day was Zack's expulsion from the Army. Zack came back, so Brennan was free to leave the bones in his capable hands once more.

Their partnership thrived. He took her into the interrogation room, showing her how evidence and body language could combine into a rich story that he teased out of living people. She learned how to probe, pry, offset, upset, unbalance and reassure (falsely, if needed). One of their most effective techniques was to simply talk to each other, laying out the facts of the case as if the suspect wasn't there, proving guilt to each other and leaving the suspect no recourse or defense. Booth taught her how to follow his lead in interrogations and as a result they'd developed a visual telepathy wherein Brennan could finally read Booth, but only when he wanted her to.

He was always able to signal her, and she almost always understood exactly what he wanted her to do. It was uncanny, the way they worked so well together.

~Q~

**October 2007**

Despite their incredible success rate (in gathering evidence and securing confessions) the FBI was threatening to break up their partnership because Booth had arrested Max Keenan (formerly known as Matthew Brennan, her father). To forestall such a calamity, the partners were referred to a therapist, which neither of them found particularly helpful and yet attendance at the sessions was mandatory. The threat of separation was enough to make Brennan bite her tongue and cooperate despite her well-advertised disdain for psychology.

The night of their final evaluative session with Dr. Lance Sweets, Booth and Brennan were still a little demoralized by their most recent case, which had closed on an unhappy ending for everyone involved. It wasn't an ideal time to be poked and prodded by a shrink. Booth groused in the elevator as they waited for it to carry them to the hated 'therapy' session. "We don't need it," he growled. They were working just fine together and their success rate spoke for itself.

She turned and caught his wrist, stilling his restless pacing around the small car. "If we don't cooperate, the FBI will split us up."

He paused, looking into her eyes for an endless second. "Maybe that's a good thing."

All the blood might have fled south of her brain, heading directly for her stricken heart. Seeing the way she looked so hurt, he shook his head and glanced away. "I don't want to work with anyone else. You're my partner. Only you."

Worrying her lower lip, she asked, "Will he separate us?"

Stepping right up to her, into her space as if it was his as well (and it was), he smiled into her eyes. "There's only one reason to separate us, and that isn't because I arrested your dad. Right?"

"Right." That was true, an undeniable fact. Brennan was afraid to loiter any longer on whatever reason Booth thought the FBI actually should separate them.

"So..." Booth's charm smile reassured her. "You follow my lead, Bones, just like this is an interrogation. Okay? It's us against them, and nobody beats us."

Nobody had yet, that was a fact as well. The smile lifted her spirits, her own coming out tentatively. "Follow your lead. Okay."

"We're partners," he promised. "Professionals. We don't mix our personal and professional lives. Okay?"

Furrowing her brow, Brennan looked doubtful. "But we do, Booth."

He stepped back when the elevator pinged. "Not as far as Doctor Sweets is concerned. You ready?"

At her nod, they walked the last few steps in silence and entered the office with serious expressions. Taking their seats, side by side, they waited for Dr. Sweets to begin.

"So? Case finished?"

The young man was watching the two of them with a vaguely annoyed expression. Through her participation in dozens of interviews with Booth, Brennan had discovered that raised eyebrows meant inquiry, but lips curled to one side coupled with a lowered chin indicated annoyed or bothered. So she knew this one. Logically, if Dr. Sweets was annoyed, and asking about the case, Brennan concluded he was hoping to hear this session would not be interrupted by a phone call the way the last one had been. "Yes," she answered crisply.

"Congratulations?"

Beside her, Booth fidgeted. Brennan kept her own puzzlement concealed, but wondered why Sweets had raised his tonal inflection, as if he wasn't sure. Perhaps he was reading their somber mood, she reflected. Two years ago, she would not have been able to read it so well either, but Booth made a remarkable tutor. She could guess people's emotions more accurately now, even though the underlying causes continued to elude her most of the time.

"Yeah," Booth replied in a flat tone.

"You don't seem too happy." It was a goad, a verbal challenge.

Brennan realized suddenly that Sweets was the interrogator, she and Booth were the suspects. Sweets was looking for a reason to separate them, and Booth knew a valid reason existed. That was why Booth wanted her to follow his lead, he would change their positions at some point and he would count on her to help when the timing was right. When he gave her the cue, she would help him distract Sweets.

For the moment, Booth was sprawled in his seat, showing a lack of attention and even discourtesy towards the young psychologist. He didn't bother to conceal how unimpressed he was with Sweets's novice skills of observation. "Well, because sometimes even if you win, you still end up with someone else's pain and screwed-up life. You work for the FBI, you should know that."

Brennan felt her attention drawing back and forth, between her partner and the man who was threatening to separate them. Now Booth was challenging Sweets; she wasn't sure why but she watched and waited patiently for Booth's cues.

"Must be a challenge for you to access those feelings," Sweets probed as a rebuttal.

Beside her, Booth twitched just slightly and Brennan forgot to follow.

This. Brennan's jaw clenched in stunned fury. _This_ was why she hated psychology. It was wrong! Sweets was looking at the wrong partner, misreading Booth completely and then to actually imply that he didn't feel it...? She couldn't keep quiet. Without even thinking, she snapped her defense of Booth's heart. "Okay, stop. You don't know Booth. You don't know me. You have a limited view of us based on superficial data you've accumulated on a standardized questionnaire; and a subjective analysis from talking to us, that is not at all scientific. So. Back. Off."

It was quite effective in subduing the younger man. Sweets all but gulped, clearly chagrined by her clinical dismissal. "Just trying to help."

Now Booth was smirking, brows quirked in amusement at the sight of his partner dressing down the annoying kid. There you go, he thought with a touch of glee: proof that we're getting along just fine.

"By questioning his humanity?" she scoffed. Stupid psychology, clearly it was useless guesswork. Booth's gut guessed far better.

Finally he leaned forward to slow her down, to pull back into the lead before she went too far. His gaze held hers, eyes twinkling, alerting her to the desired change in mood. "Okay, Bones, now you're going a little bit overboard. He's just a kid, right? I mean, the worst thing that ever happened to _him_ is that he lost at Mortal Kombat."

Between the lines she knew what he was telling her: relax. Don't give away too much. So she subsided, letting Booth take over again.

Just in time, because Sweets had picked up on plenty of subtext. The defense, the deflection, the hidden direction. Unfortunately, as was rapidly becoming typical, he also completely misconstrued it. "Are you normally this protective of him, Dr. Brennan?"

Howard Epps. Valeska Miller. Working with her father to rescue Booth from Gallagher. This question, taken with Booth's playful demeanor, suggested that Sweets was thinking Brennan's defense was out of character for her. But it wasn't. Professional only, Booth had coached, so she gave the professional answer. "We are partners," she replied with what she knew was a rational, steady tone, the same one she used to give her testimony in court. "Our lives depend on being protective of each other."

"And you feel the same way, Agent Booth?"

Epps. Jamie Kenton. New Orleans. The Gravedigger. They didn't look at each other, but she felt Booth's body moving restlessly beside her. He knew she trusted him with her life, with her past, with everything. She knew he trusted her just as much. Booth pinned a steady and confident gaze on the psychologist, relaying just how much trust he had with Brennan, and how little it mattered to either of them that he'd arrested her father.

"Sweets, I can only hope that one day you'll know what a true partnership is."

Pushing ahead, Sweets declared with a hint of self-deprecation, "You two are very close. That was evident in your 'superficial, standardized questionnaire,' and my 'unscientific' observations."

"Yeah?" Booth didn't quite sound convinced.

"You complement each other," Sweets added.

She frowned and barely resisted a tolerant sigh when Booth laughed, "Oh, no, she _never_ compliments me."

But then he leaned towards her to ask curiously, "Did you compliment me in the questionnaire?"

Yes she did so compliment him, often, but that wasn't what Sweets meant. Brennan leaned towards him to correct his error. "Compl_E_ment, not compl_I_ment. '_Pleh_.' He means that we complete each other, as a team."

"Yeah, right," Booth agreed sheepishly.

"Now, we've got a lot to work on over the next few months," Sweets continued.

Brennan and Booth instinctively turned to one another, sharing hopeful glances. Cautiously, she confirmed, "meaning ... we get to stay together?"

"Yes," he hedged.

"I'm sensing a 'but,'" Booth remarked to Brennan.

"...However..."

"Same as a 'but," Brennan returned to Booth.

Sweets pushed on, determined to keep them on track and therefore wording it very carefully so they couldn't derail the discussion again. "I have observed some ... underlying issues that need to be addressed."

Feeling Brennan's concerned glance, Booth prompted, "Issues..."

Almost victorious, Sweets revealed his ace in the hole. "There's clearly a very ... _deep_ ... emotional attachment between you two."

Right, Booth thought in a barely concealed panic. Sweets had deliberately avoided calling it what it really was: love. He was in love with her, she was in love with him. They spent too much personal time together, knew each other better than either of them knew anyone else, would kill for each other. And if the Bureau knew, they'd be separated in a heartbeat. So he kept his poker face firmly in place and lied distinctly. "We're just partners."

Because the only damn line they hadn't crossed yet was sex.

Sweets challenged with a curious tilt to his brow, "And uh, why do you think I would have thought otherwise…?"

_Because,_ Booth nearly choked, _I think about her all the time; Sweets knows that because that's the question number seven that I accidentally answered '12-15 times per day.'_ When he'd blurted that out to her a couple of days ago, Brennan's eyes had rounded and she'd primly reminded him they weren't supposed to discuss their answers with each other. "Because, you're twelve," he pushed, shoving the young psychologist off the scent with a deliberately offensive thrust to the ego.

Sometimes, Brennan could read his mind. Probably remembering that damn question number seven, his genius partner hastened to deflect Sweets even further by sticking to the script and discounting his number seven blunder all in one brilliant summation. "Don't read anything into what Booth said. We're professionals. There's a line that doesn't even need to be there."

"Not at all." Quickly regrouping Booth added, "I mean, if there were no more murders, I would probably not even see her."

"Very true," she agreed softly.

"Might have coffee," Booth amended, suddenly realizing he didn't want Sweets to think they hated each other. That would be bad also. They were friends, friendly professionals who worked together.

"Probably not," she countered.

"What?" The puncture of his friendly professional front made Booth look over to her in unfeigned dismay that immediately caught her attention.

"What?" She echoed him, now confused and worried.

He forgot Sweets was there, not able or willing to hide how disappointed he was. "You wouldn't even have coffee with me?"

She was now very confused. "Well, in your scenario we wouldn't even know each other because there are no murders."

"_More_," he corrected, relieved to be merely misunderstood. "If there were no_ more_ murders."

She pursed her lips, considering it. "Then, fine. We could have coffee."

They fell into each other, gazes locked, coffee established as the thing that linked them, as the code word that described who they were. Stimulating. Warm. Versatile (bitter or sweet, hot or cold, flavored or plain). Comforting. Something shared between friends. "So that's clear, then," Brennan said. "We'd have coffee, and that's our relationship. Coffee?"

Suddenly remembering where they were, Booth tore his eyes away. "Yeah, let's move on."

He discovered Sweets was watching their entire exchange with a surprising fondness, as if they'd enchanted him. Great. Now they had a groupie.

~Q~

Newton's Cradle operates on the basis of the laws of physics.

Over dinner in the Diner one evening, Booth had looked into Brennan's eyes and informed her that making love could result in breaking the laws of physics, a metaphoric hyperbole she had scoffed at. Nothing yet has been found that breaks universal laws of motion and energy, at least not in terms of sexual intercourse. The laws of physics governed matter and energy everywhere, including between two people.

Newton's Cradle was the perfect example: set one ball in motion and it would propel a ball at the far end into motion, energy of movement transferring back and forth, converting itself in repeating cycles of transferred potential to kinetic to potential energy.

There was potential energy between them, held in every sizzling glance, in every affectionate touch, in every brush against each other. The potential between them sang in her blood, pounded in her pulse, whispered in her dreams. The potential transferred to kinetic, the energy of motion, whenever they were pulled apart.

Pull them apart and they would come back together, the first law of motion. It would go on indefinitely, their respective balls clicking together and apart for eternity but for the presence of friction. Their friction slowed them down, decreasing momentum, reducing the energies that kept them apart, that kept them in motion, until the bright steel came to a complete stop, side by side.

Coming together at last could not break the laws of physics, it could only fulfill them.

This was how she knew it was true: she had the evidence. Looking back over their nearly three years of partnership, Brennan found repeated instances of separations that ended with reunions. That first case. Shakila Jackson. Cam. Epps. Her experiment with Sully, his arrest of her father for a capital murder charge. Zack's departure for Iraq. And a surly Federal Prosecutor who announced their partnership had been severed.

~Q~

**May 2008**

Lemon yellow sunlight was streaming in through through her windows that morning as Brennan reached past a Smurfette figurine to locate the mate to her mother's earring. Slipping them into her lobes by touch, she felt them sway next to her neck, half hidden by her hair. They had belonged to her mother, but for the last two years they had been a gift from Booth.

This was the first day without him, without the partnership that had become so much a part of her life over the past three years. A long day of confinement at the lab stretched ahead of her, ancient identifications, dry bones, pure research. The oddly hexagonal body would be curled up in the Bone Room, Zack's puzzle to solve, and Brennan herself would be relegated to Limbo. She sighed, troubled with the cloying unhappiness that had followed her home from the crime scene last night.

No more partnership. It felt like being fired, or possibly this was what a divorce felt like. _Oh, that's just great,_ she scolded herself. _You aren't married to him, you don't even believe in marriage._ Before she could really lecture the maudlin woman in her mirror, a knock at the front door interrupted her.

"Hey, Bones, open up!"

Pleased, surprised confusion, hope; she pulled her front door open to see her partner standing there (former partner, she reminded herself) wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and a delighted grin. "Good morning," he chirped. "You ready?"

Her mandible fell into a gaping position, an assortment of questions clamoring for first place. "For what?" she finally managed.

"Coffee."

His eyes, hot like coffee, poured warmth into her. She felt her heart leap, her throat catch, her brain stagger, all from one small word. From the promise of that beverage and what it meant to them. No more murders... "Oh," she breathed.

"Don't forget your purse, Bones." He waited until she had it slung over her shoulder before reaching forward, taking her hand into his and pulling her closer. Their fingers interlocked and didn't separate until he handed her into the SUV. At the Diner, he took her hand again, led her in to their table and sat down beside her.

Beside her, not across. She blamed the tinge of dizziness on low blood sugar.

"Booth?"

"Yes?"

His body was so close, so warm and her heart was racing faster than her thoughts (just barely faster) because he was looking at her with hot coffee eyes and she gulped. "How often are we going to have coffee?"

"As often as you want."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: As I said in the previous note, by the time they were sent to Sweets, Booth and Brennan knew how to work together in an interrogation. They had something to hide from Sweets and they hid it very well, which is why he was so far off with the first thesis of his book (when he wrote they put their job above a personal relationship).

And ... did anybody else notice that Booth was sitting _beside_ Brennan when they told Sweets they'd been split up...? That's pretty much the only time I can recall them sitting together like that. Hmmmm...


	26. The Line That Vanished

Author's Note: We have arrived at the (mostly AU but not quite, as I will demonstrate) romance portion of this story. A couple of lines later on may justify what I'm writing here, even though we have departed from official canon as far as we currently understand it. I'll let you know when we get to those.

* * *

~Q~

~The Line That Vanished~

~Q~

Lucetta: **Then thus: of many good I think him best.**

Julia: **Your reason?**

Lucetta: **I have no other, but a woman's reason; I think him so because I think him so.**

Julia: **And wouldst thou have me cast my love on him?**

Lucetta: **Ay, if you thought your love not cast away.**

Julia: **Why he, of all the rest, hath never moved me.**

Lucetta: **Yet he, of all the rest, I think, best loves ye.**

Julia: **His little speaking shows his love but small.**

Lucetta: **Fire that's closest kept burns most of all.**

Julia: **They do not love that do not show their love.**

Lucetta: **O, they love least that let men know their love.**

Julia: **I would I knew his mind.**

_Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act I, Scene 2_

~Q~

Brennan felt Booth's hand slide into hers under the table, squeezing her palm lightly and she asked bravely, "What if I want it every day?"

A decidedly cocky leer sailed her way. "I aim to please. If you want … coffee … every day, I'm there for you."

"Coffee can be habit-forming," she mused. He laughed and squeezed her hand again before gently depositing it in her lap. Booth's large and comforting presence so close beside her dominated her thoughts as well as her senses, leaving her in a state of near constant distraction.

Vera bustled up to their table and greeted them with an assessing grin. "Musical chairs?"

It was because Booth was too close, that was why her brain couldn't keep up with even basic cultural references. Completely baffled, Brennan glanced around the Diner and cautiously informed their waitress, "There isn't any music playing."

Vera chuckled. "I'm talking about the new seating arrangements." She nodded significantly at Booth, sitting beside his partner for the first time ever as far as Royal Diner recorded history was concerned.

Leaning back casually, Booth shrugged it off as mere preparation. "We're meeting someone."

She wasn't convinced but poured their coffees with an encouraging grin and a promise to place their usual orders right away. After Vera's departure, a very curious Brennan leaned closer and whispered, "Who are we meeting?"

"No one."

That earned him another baffled pinching of brows so he shifted slightly further away and explained quietly. "You are temporarily suspended from working with the FBI. Since we don't know how the trial is going to work out, let's just be circumspect in public. Okay? We've left a chair open because we're meeting someone…."

"What if my father is convicted," she finally asked. He likely would be, as the evidence against him was very compelling. An impending sense of dread started to tighten her chest, both for her father's fate and for the impact it would have on her. Really, she couldn't bear to think of it and Booth was so close she couldn't think of anything else so Brennan allowed the worry to slip away for a while longer. She knew she was on 'borrowed time,' a saying Angela had used, and eventually she would have to face reality but for now ... reality had her partner sitting so close their arms brushed and her pulse and respiration had increased substantially.

"That is a possibility," Booth agreed.

"Would the FBI continue to insist we can't work together?"

He sighed, having spent plenty of time worrying over that likelihood since Caroline Julian had divided them at the crime scene the previous night. "It's a possibility, Bones."

"Why?" she exclaimed. "Obviously I don't hold his arrest against you. If I did, we wouldn't be having coffee right now."

"I know," he soothed, stroking her arm to quiet her.

"You were just doing your job," she continued. "And Dad, he let you arrest him. That's what you said." He'd told her that at Angela and Hodgins's aborted wedding. Her father had assured her of his choice as well. How could she be angry when the two of them were in agreement that arrest was the honorable course?

As if he understood that he needed to remind her of Max's reasoning, Booth replied, "Yeah, Bones. He let me arrest him so he could have a chance to mend things with you."

She nodded, tears stinging her eyes. "We did mend things. We're fine. So, that was a good thing, right?"

Another tender touch on her arm and Booth sighed with a father's sad and knowing eyes. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure Max will say it was worth it."

They fell silent for a few moments while she looked out the window and brought her emotions back in line and Booth gave her the time as well as a soothing hand on her shoulder. Vera returned with a whole grain bagel and a bowl of fresh fruit for Brennan, a three-egg omelet with bacon and hashbrowns for Booth. "Anything else?"

"More coffee," Booth requested.

"Booth?"

"Yes, Bones?"

She waited until her silence brought his gaze around to hers because this question might be the most important one of all. "What does coffee mean?"

"For us?" he clarified.

"Coffee doesn't have any intrinsic meaning; it is merely a beverage. Although, it has existed for over a thousand years and supplanted tea as the beverage of choice in the future United States as a result of the Tea Act and subsequent embargoes during the—"

"Bones, you're babbling," he chuckled.

Vera was back pouring fresh coffee into their cups, not even bothering to pretend she wasn't eavesdropping.

"Like a brook," she sighed, astonishing them both with her agreement. Brennan realized with a churning inside that she didn't even know what she hoped he would say so she'd started speaking rapidly to fill in the silence and avoid any disappointment or worse, life-altering proclamations he might make. But that was foolish, irrational. Rationally, she reminded herself, it made more sense to spell things out. To know where things stood.

"Why?" Searching his memory, he didn't think he could ever recall her speaking without purpose. It was an amusing new side of her, this nervousness.

"What does it mean?" She asked again, quite serious this time.

The steady gazes those two could pull were the talk of the Royal Diner staff and Vera knew she'd be adding another tally mark to the chart the staff had placed right next to their time cards. They were at it again now, gazing at each other, blissfully unaware of Vera's amused presence as Special Agent Booth assured Dr. Brennan, "Coffee means no matter what's going on with our jobs, nothing is going to come between us. Nothing can separate us unless we let it."

And Dr. Brennan smiled, seemed to relax a little. Still holding their gaze, she mused, "Drinking coffee was considered patriotic. It reminds me of you."

He grinned and took a sip, finally dropping out of their ocular embrace. "Drinking coffee reminds me of you, too."

"How?"

Vera hung around just long enough to hear, "It makes me think faster and if I'm not careful I get burned."

"I do not burn you."

"Yes you do."

"I have never caused heat damage to your epidermis."

"There's more than one way to get burned, Bones."

When she got back to the kitchen, Vera was grinning broadly. "I give it a month, Steve. How high is the pool now?"

"Two hundred bucks," the cook grunted.

Vera pulled a wad of singles out of her pocket. "I'm adding to it right now..."

"Why?" Oh, this must be good, Steve realized. Vera was smirking like the cat that ate a whole cage full of canaries.

"They're sitting next to each other."

Steve stuck his head out the service window to see for himself. It was pretty obvious even to an old dunderhead like him that something had changed...

~Q~

Leaving the jail after her visit with Angela, Brennan paused in the parking lot and tilted her head back to take in the orange glow of sunset. For the first time, she permitted herself to wonder if her father felt his own approaching sunset. All during the last months of his imprisonment, during the time of separation, the days of trial preparation, these days of the trial itself, all that time the question of conviction was one she avoided considering. The evidence, although circumstantial, was rather damning. He would probably be convicted; she'd known it.

But she hadn't felt it. She wouldn't let herself think of it.

Dr. Sweets had even pushed her about it, suggesting she was cold on the outside because she was mostly in pain within. Little did he know how wrong he was. _How angrily I taught my brow to frown, when inward joy enforced my heart to smile!_ Yet more proof that psychology was a waste of time and of Sweets's intellect because Brennan knew her outward calm was a direct result of her trying to hide how happy she was with everything else in her life. If not for her father's impending conviction, she could quite accurately be described as existing in a sort of bliss.

Only when Angela steadfastly refused to participate in the trial did Brennan finally consider the possibility of her father's execution. Twin terrors finally rippled through her, the fears she'd been able to push aside because the change in her friendship with Booth had sustained her so well over the last month. If her father was convicted, he would die, and her partnership with Booth might end permanently.

~Q~

Russ was the one who made her see what she had to do. "He stayed because of me," she'd said, defending Max against Russ's angry accusation that Max should have fled and stayed away rather than letting Booth arrest him.

Max gripped her hand reassuringly. "I would have stayed here forever. It was worth every second we had together."

It was exactly what Booth had said, one father understanding another, and she felt a surge of pain quite unlike any she'd ever experienced before. This might be guilt, a sense of responsibility for the injustice of a man dying because she hadn't been able to forgive him. At some point, Max Keenan/Matthew Brennan had realized the only route to redemption was to stay and mend his daughter's broken heart, yet doing so ensured his own demise. It was a sacrifice, but now more than ever she understood she could not let him suffer it. Turning to the despondent defense attorney, Brennan asked how long he would need if she could produce a viable alternative suspect.

He said, only a few minutes if the story was compelling enough.

She already knew what she had to do, but first there was evidence to review and a particular question to settle. Jumping up, she flew out of the conference chamber and dashed through security until she reached the exit. Bursting outside with her purse in hand, Brennan dug for her cell phone because she needed to understand the ethics of the situation. The last time she'd acted on an impulse of questionable ethics Booth had not reacted well. He'd drawn a line. This time, she would be more cautious.

He answered her immediately, his voice steady and compassionate. "Hey, Bones. How's your Dad doing?"

"He's fine, for now." He would be fine forever if she could make this sudden plan happen. She would need to review the trace evidence, but Brennan was confident she had the solution. Her only real concern was ensuring her plan did not violate any laws or established ethical concerns. "Booth, can we have coffee tomorrow morning?"

There was a slight hesitation which she read as caution under their current circumstances. "You know we have to be more careful during the trial."

"It's just coffee, Booth."

"Ah, I see what's going on," he teased. "You're missing me."

~Q~

But if he thought she was missing him, their breakfast together didn't run as he'd expected. Brennan was preoccupied with questions of morality, comments about justice in the Arriba tribe (or something like that), preponderance of evidence, and on and on. Every time he tried to redirect her to subjects more entertaining, she determinedly switched them back.

"If the truth can't be proven, is it still the truth?"

Exasperated, Booth finally threw up his hands in defeat. "You invited me to breakfast to talk philosophy?"

"A theory isn't even really a theory until it's challenged. It's just simply a hypothesis. I don't believe a man should die based upon a hypothesis. Do you?"

Confusion shook his head, because he finally realized she had not simply missed him. There was something on her mind. "If you have a question, just ask it."

They were sitting together at the lunch counter in the Diner, and when she turned to him, those eyes were burning with an intensity he couldn't resist. Leaning toward him, she explained softly, "I have a way to lodge reasonable doubt into the jury."

Of course, he should have realized sooner. And he knew he was damned to give in to a woman so beautiful, her eyes sparkling with hope and incipient genius that he could not look away. Gritting his teeth, Booth eyed her meaningfully. "We can't talk about this!"

But he already knew he was going to, just from the way she looked at him.

"Please," she murmured. "You're the person I talk to about things like this."

He held her pleading gaze a full ten seconds, weighing risks, and finally realized what she was really asking him for with all the rambling questions and anthropological lectures he'd endured that morning: the moral guidelines. "No perjury involved. Just an interpretation of existing facts."

This was what she needed to know, if it was acceptable to use existing evidence to posit an alternate theory of the crime. Cam had done it once, and she had strenuously objected because it would cast suspicion on a man she knew was innocent. This time, Brennan would direct suspicion away from a man she knew was guilty. Objectively, it would be wrong. Subjectively, her emotional attachment to her father was telling her to do it.

"An alternate story," she agreed softly. Hopefully.

"You know, you don't know that he did it," Booth pointed out. "Your old man."

"No, we both know he did it," she whispered low, leaning closer still.

Holding her gaze again, he clarified, "Well, not the way that _you_ define '_know,_' with proof and all that."

"It's going to be enough for the jury."

"Juries are the human factor in a trial. You never know what they'll do."

Hesitantly, she asked again for the guidance. "You think it's all right for me to take advantage of that?"

And then Booth reminded her to use her brain and her heart; that's how she knew he would support her as long as he didn't have to perjure himself.

~Q~

They didn't speak again that day, but she'd watched Booth's face turn pale and grave as he recognized her plan to save her father, and his part in it. His eyes blazed into hers from across the room as he choked out, "That's a lot of heart, Bones."

He refused to look at her any more for the rest of the day, leaving the court the moment the judge had excused him and letting her worried calls go to voice mail. Arriving home, uncertain what it meant, Brennan found that waiting was an agony of suspense and when the knock finally sounded on her door she was unspeakably relieved. Brennan opened it to find him standing on the other side with a reproachful frown that captured her immediately.

"Booth?"

"I just realized something," he said slowly, deliberately. Before she could ask what it was, he'd moved into her space and shut the door behind him. He took her arm and pulled her closer, his eyes drilling deeply into hers.

Brennan felt a tremor, her body going into high alert at the intensity of his gaze and the way he seemed poised to devour her. "What," she asked with scarcely enough air to manage the question.

"You made me cross a line today."

Her eyes went wide and she backed up a step. "I'm sorry," she whispered, and meant it. She hadn't really thought that part through, what she would have to ask of him. Watching him struggle over her, hearing the agony when he insisted he _knew_ her and she could not have done this … by the time she'd understood what it was doing to him it was too late to stop.

"How could you ask me to sacrifice you for your father? How could you do that to me?"

"I didn't think about it that way."

Pain sharpened his tone. "You could be charged with murder. It's a death penalty case, for God's sake!"

She went a bit pale, but kept her eyes steady on his. He felt like he was drowning in her, in what she would ask him to do and what he was willing to do for her. Lines crossed to and fro, danced over so many times there was nothing but dusty footprints where a line used to be.

Partners weren't supposed to be this close, this devoted to one another. They weren't supposed to fall in love. For the last two years, he'd tried to convince himself that he wasn't in love with Temperance Brennan but it was a fool's errand. He'd never felt this way about another woman, so tied up in knots with her that they moved and breathed together. The fact that he was willing to do anything for her was matched only by his fear of what it meant that she'd asked him to do _this_. Did it mean the same thing to her? Did she _understand_ what she'd asked him to do?

The problem was, he could never read her mind (which he had to admit had been one of the things that most attracted him at first). Though he knew Brennan better than anyone else—in some ways better than even Angela knew her—he'd not seen this coming. She'd asked for his advice at the Diner that morning but really, what she'd asked him for was his consent. She'd wanted his complicity in a tacit lie, and no matter how much he'd tried to mitigate it, he'd been forced to let a jury believe she could kill a man, gut him, and burn him. Without words, she'd begged Booth not to defend her, and he choked on his vow to help.

He'd stipulated that he would not commit perjury and damn her, she'd found the loophole that implicated her while forcing him to honestly render her up to Caesar. Because there was nothing he wouldn't do for her, but he'd never counted on having to help her crucify herself.

"Was it worth it?" he asked softly, bitterly. "Was it worth it to cast me as Judas?"

Biting her lip, blinking away rainy teardrops, her head trembled an unsteady nod. Angela had made her understand, Angela and Booth, and then Russ. Max had stayed, allowed himself to be captured and subjected to a trial that would result in conviction and execution, all for a chance at her forgiveness. "He sacrificed himself for me. He stayed for _me_, Booth."

It always pained him when she cried but this … God, it was so much worse. "That's why?"

"I couldn't let him … not for me." Holding back a sob, she shook her head. She already knew what it felt like to have her father be dead, and she didn't want to have to feel that again knowing this time it was her fault.

"Bones, no." He tugged her closer, burying her in a tender embrace that wasn't a 'guy hug.' This was over the line, their hearts bonded so closely that their bodies would inevitably follow. He knew it was destined for them to blur the final boundaries. "You're worth it," he murmured into her ear and felt his own fury loosen.

"No, I'm not worth dying over."

"Yes you are, damn-it! I crossed the line for you today." Because he couldn't lose her. And so he'd lied. God help him, he'd lied on the witness stand, told the court Temperance Brennan could not kill someone in such a calculated manner when he damn well knew she could. She'd tried it once before, when he'd barely stopped her from killing Epps for him. No one had asked him, but Sweets had testified that she was capable of rationalizing murder and Booth had not been able to implicate her without trying to undo that damaging assessment first.

So he'd lied under oath, volunteered perjury to protect her even as he gave her up to the mercy of the court.

"The minute I realized I would do anything for you … what the hell am I holding back from now? Why bother?"

Brennan pulled away, clearly confused by what he was saying, and the frustration that sharpened his tone. "I … don't understand." Fear streaked through her eyes a moment later and her pulse exploded in something like terror. "You don't want to be partners?"

"We're not _'partners_,' Bones. Don't you get it?"

"Booth," she gasped, "please."

"Partners don't feel this way. Partners don't do these things."

Pulling herself further away, she held still as if preparing for a blow. "What things?"

He stalked towards her, pushing her backwards until her back hit a wall and she was forced to a halt. Brennan tilted her head back, at a rare height disadvantage because she was at home and barefoot. Bringing a hand up to plant it firmly beside her head, he flashed back to another time he'd held her trapped like this. The frustration he'd felt for her that afternoon at the shooting range had nothing on what was boiling in him now.

"You made me betray you," he accused, a low growl that rumbled in her bones.

Memory flared brightly and she lowered her eyes, avoiding his now. "You did it before. The end justifies the means."

"You told me we weren't partners that night, Bones. You told me never to do that again, to betray you. Remember?"

Of course she did. Brennan nodded hesitantly, sensing something behind this reminiscence, something he was about to change.

"Today you made me break that promise. So that means, we're not partners."

Was he ending them? His large body was so close, hemming her in, his scent of pepper and perspiration and fully aroused _male_ swirling around her like a sweet, smoky haze. Though she trusted him, this Booth was driving her pulse too high, her body on alert and her comprehension too scattered. He didn't seem angry (more like frantic and frustrated) but she felt very much under threat, as if he was poised to bring everything she'd ever known crashing down around her. "What are you saying?"

"There's no partnership, there's no line. There's only you, and me."

"I don't know what that means." Her eyes finally lifted and begged him to explain.

She was uneasy and he hadn't been clear. He could see that she needed to know his intention. "It means I'm going to kiss you."

Startled at his blunt statement, she could only offer a breathy sound to indicate she'd heard him. "Oh…"

"Is that okay with you?" Yet he didn't wait because he knew she was more than capable of making any objections known. He drew her fully against him, his left hand plunging into her hair and palming her head backwards while his right arm snaked across the small of her back and bound her against him. And his mouth came down.

Their lips brushed so softly she felt his breath more than the man but before she could do more than moan a complaint at the too-brief contact he was back again. His hot mouth closed over hers, his lips sweeping hers open while his hand maneuvered her into position. The kiss grew slowly, mouths fusing and parting, returning again, and when his tongue curled in past her soft little panting breaths, she fought back with an answering heat.

Their arms twined in a desperate tangle, their bodies coiling together in a helix.

This was nothing like their mistletoe kiss at Christmas. No witnesses, no reservation, just passion too long denied. It went out of control very quickly, as they'd both known it would. In moments he had her pressed back against the wall while he ground himself into her. His free hand traced a path from sloping shoulders, tapering waist so slender his fingers curled around it, and down over flaring hips that he pulled sharply against his.

Brennan's arms definitely weren't slack; they had already wrapped around his torso while her dexterous hands had his T-shirt untucked. Sliding under the cloth, her palms warmed over his spine, fingers tracing delicately over the spinous processes beginning with the large fourth lumbar vertebrae. The firm nubs of bone rippled under her moving fingers that smoothed upwards to trace his thoracic vertebrae and then fan out over his firm ribs, the ones that had flanged outwards over someone he'd protected from a bomb.

That memory triggered others, a time when he'd been hurt protecting her. Broken clavicle on an x-ray, Cam in the hospital, Epps standing in her bedroom with a crow bar. There had been a day on a park bench when he'd explained. _"What happened to Cam happened because we had a personal relationship."_

"Booth," she breathed against his mouth. "Booth, you said…"

"No talking, Bones. You're not going to argue your way out of this." He took the kiss deeper, silencing her for several minutes while his teasing lips swept heatedly over hers and his tongue speared into her, darting in and out like lightening.

He'd made speaking impossible, but her thoughts screamed over nearly four years of history. She had questions. Worries. She needed answers._ "I'd ask you out if I could … FBI regulations … People who work in high risk situations, they can't be involved romantically, or else things like this happen. … Every single day, it's with us, and there's this line that we can't cross."_

"Wait," she finally gasped, pushing his mouth away from hers and fighting for sanity while he began sketching a burning path along her throat. "You said the FBI won't let partners…"

"We're not partners," he growled darkly. "I thought I made that clear."

Another burst of fear animated her. She pushed him back, using a self-defense move to get his attention. Tears had returned to her eyes when she looked at his dark and dangerous face. "Are you angry? Is this a punishment?"

Realizing suddenly that she was misunderstanding him, he stepped back far enough to give her space but not so far that they lost contact. "No. This is me, accepting reality." He waited for her to ask and she didn't disappoint.

"What reality?"

Capturing her eyes, Booth finally spoke the truth. "That I'm in love with you."

Brennan suffered a rare moment of speechlessness while he closed in on her again.

"Today I saw that I'm in too deep." He barked a short, furious laugh. "There's never been a line between us; it's insanity to keep pretending we didn't cross it years ago. I love you, Bones. I think I proved that today. And the FBI already split us up so there's no damn reason to hold back."

"But the trial's almost over," she said softly. The arguments had closed and the jury was currently sequestered, still deliberating at that very moment.

"I don't care. I want you, I want this."

Torn over how to express herself, confused over feelings, Brennan bit her lip. "I love working with you."

"But do you love _me_? Or just the job?"

"I … I don't know." Drawing a shaking breath, she placed her palm against his chest. Whether the touch was intended to hold him back or to establish contact, even she wasn't certain. She didn't understand what she felt, what it was, only that it was strong and it had never wavered. Honesty was the only gift she had. "I've always wanted to be next to you."

"You are next to me. I'm right here." He was pulling her closer again, pulling her into him. Her arm bent as he ended their separation, proving the hand she'd placed upon him was for contact.

The pain in her finally reached him when she explained what she'd heard. "You don't want to work with me anymore."

Literal to a fault. For all her intelligence, Brennan sometimes needed things spelled out to her. He chuckled softly, recognizing her own unique innocence and his impatience could create all sorts of confusion if he wasn't vigilant. "I'm not saying I don't want to work with you, Bones. What I'm saying is, I've been thinking that not getting physical with you would stop us from getting too close and clouding our judgment. What I've come to realize is, we're already too close. What did Sweets call it? _'A deep, emotional attachment.'_"

She nodded agreement that indeed, Dr. Sweets had described them thus, the excuse he gave to keep prying into their partnership.

"Love." The whispered word wrapped around them.

He touched her cheek tenderly. "I would do anything for you, and I've been feeling that way for years. What I _feel_ is what pushed me over the line. So why shouldn't I go ahead and kiss you?"

Brennan still looked uncertain, yet a flare of longing had ignited in her soft steel eyes.

"We'll take it slow," he promised. "Okay? Just kissing and holding hands for now, until we're both ready for more."

When she acquiesced with a silent nod, hesitant yet hopeful, he bent and brushed another slow kiss over her willing lips. It ripened slowly, mouths moving in concert, his tongue curling into her, their breaths mingling.

"God," he panted, pulling back to nuzzle her ear. "Baby, kissing you is incredible."

"I know," she murmured, eagerly seeking more.

And he laughed, because for once it wasn't her conceit speaking. Her actions told him exactly what she meant.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Did you see this coming? Booth lied under oath. Strap yourselves in, readers, all hell is about to break loose and very soon I'll be showing you the clues that suggest this may not be as AU as it seems...


	27. The End of the Dream

Author's Note: How quickly things can change...

* * *

~Q~

~The End of the Dream~

~Q~

**Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,  
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.  
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments  
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices  
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,  
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,  
The clouds methought would open and show riches  
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,  
I cried to dream again. **

_(The Tempest, Act 3, Scene 2, Lines 135-43)_

~Q~

Long ago in middle school (back before the state of Illinois decided to enforce the separation of church and state more stringently), Brennan had taken a choral music elective and in it, she'd learned the words to an old Southern Spiritual. These were the folk songs that had sustained African Americans during the hardships of slavery and later deeply rooted prejudice, songs that spoke of a hope for justice and better times ahead (even if they had to die in order to reach them). As a fourteen year old avowed atheist, Brennan didn't particularly care for the music yet her astonishing memory ensured the lyrics would remain permanently etched once she'd learned them.

After her own plunge into something resembling slavery (family vanished, torn from her home, moved to a foreign place, forced in one case to work endlessly under cruel and occasionally inhuman abuse), the lyrics to that song surfaced and Temperance Brennan began to sing. _"Soon I will be done, with all the troubles of the world, Lord."_ Every night, she whispered the song, singing words that now held a special meaning for her because of the promise of its verses: Soon, her troubles would be over; she would be with her mother; she would be with her father; she would be with her brother. _"I'm going home..."_

She never got home, never got to see her mother again, but the other promises were fulfilled over the years. Mother found (dead but accounted for and laid to rest), brother returned, father restored (death sentence averted), all of them free from the plot that had scattered them in the first place. And she, the lonely, atheist girl who'd crooned a Spiritual in the darkness of a car trunk, hummed the tune one brilliant May morning with the assurance that all her troubles had ended. For the first time since she first learned the words, Brennan had no troubles to sing about.

The coffee dates with Booth had expanded to lunch and dinner dates, evenings together at his place or hers, and moments of physical intimacy that Booth described in confusing sports metaphors. He would always call things to a halt at 'third base,' which inevitably ended up frustrating his passionate and unrestrained partner. "I thought the point of baseball was to run to home base and score."

"It is," he'd chuckle.

"Then why won't you let me score?"

Then he'd laugh and pull her into a sweet embrace that would somehow soothe her even as her body hummed its disappointment.

~Q~

The only other thing that puzzled her was his apparent reluctance to reveal the changed nature of their partnership to others. Citing the worry of official FBI disapproval plus a desire for privacy, their public interactions remained friendly and platonic to any observers, and the time they spent together was confined to work, meals out (alone) or evenings in (alone).

So it was with no small measure of surprise that Brennan walked into the Checkerbox restaurant in Alexandria one night and spotted Hodgins, Angela, Cam and Zack sitting at a nearby table. Booth was there also, having called her to meet him. Brennan's steps slowed to a suspicious halt. "What's going on?"

Was he going to announce something? Was he going to announce _them_? Why here? And with Sweets sitting there…? Curiosity peppered her next query, which probably sounded blunt and impatient because Brennan still did not like surprises.

"Why did you call me here, Booth?"

He smirked, holding out his hands in mock innocence. "Your need to sing in front of a _live_ audience. It's innate, Bones."

"No way…." He was referring to what she'd said earlier, that she could sing and her mother had declared Brennan sang better than Cyndi Lauper. When he'd challenged her to prove it, she'd declined for lack of inspiration. She stepped closer, studying him for a clue to how worried this odd set-up should make her.

"Hey. I got the music, the frivolity…" and a challenging little gleam in his eyes that dared her to say no. "What else do you need?"

Cheers from her friends added to the pressure and to the depths of her suspicion that Booth intended to out their coffee arrangement publicly before the night was finished. Somehow that thought was what started to push her into agreement, a moment before the piano started up a lively chorus of _Girls Just Want to Have Fun_.

Sweets must have thought she needed additional prodding. He got behind her, nudging her forward. "You're very controlling, I think it would be a good idea for you to let yourself go."

"Really." Brennan paused to challenge him because there was no way she'd be forced to sing in public without taking him down right afterwards. "What about _you_?"

"Hey! I will be singing _Lime in 'da Coconut_ right after you and you will be extremely impressed, as was my abnormal psychology class in college." The most boyish grin he'd ever managed to produce took the shrinky edge out of his challenge for her to 'let go,' but she was mostly swayed because of what he said next. "This opportunity is a gift from Agent Booth. Trust yourself; trust your friends. Let 'er rip. Let's hear it."

She turned, eyes finding Booth, (the person she trusted most in this world) and it was that trust that gifted her with a surprising degree of calm as she let him push her toward the stage. His breath brushed against her ear. "Better than Cyndi. Prove it, Bones." A small shiver danced down her arm as she pulled away, climbed up to face him taking his seat at the edge of the stage. He was watching her with an adoring anticipation, as if the greater part of him fully expected her to perform as skillfully as she'd insisted she could.

And then a cheeky little grin that told her he would never let this drop if she didn't.

Brennan laughed, knowing she would triumph, and she yanked off her jacket and sent it flying with a carelessness she rarely indulged. Sweets had claimed there were two different types of singers, presentational and representational. This was not a presentation, not an act or attention seeking; she was feeling and therefore representing happiness, a girl who was finally having fun. She was standing in her living room at age fourteen, singing with her family again. All the joy that had been locked up for years spilled out into lively dancing as the song took over, took her back to the life she'd lost and drew her forward into the life she'd regained.

She sang to Booth, watched the proof of her talent unfold in his delighted surprise to see _this_ Tempe, the one she kept hidden. The one who could sing and dance, laugh and tell jokes, the one who had known love and could love in return. This Tempe understood the gift he had given her: family, friends, love and acceptance. And joy. Happily ever after might begin right now, in this moment when everything she'd ever wanted was right in front of her, and she was singing to a man she knew she loved.

Seeley Booth thought he was in love with Temperance Brennan ten minutes ago, when all he'd ever viewed were flashes and glimpses of the radiance concealed within her tightly guarded fortress. That was nothing compared to what he was feeling now, seeing her as she truly was. All of her walls were gone, freeing Tempe for the first time in nearly twenty years, and she was dazzling. Nothing could tear his eyes away from her.

Nothing.

Not even his name, called out in an unfamiliar voice.

"Seeley!"

Someone was calling his name but he ignored the distraction. Bones was just so delightful, so innocent and beautiful and unbelievably carefree that he could not look away even for a moment.

"_Seeley!_" The feminine voice sounded more strident, demanding.

Reluctantly, he turned to see Pam Noonan standing behind him at the bar. She muttered something and reached into her purse. Implicit menace made him start to stand even before he saw that she'd extracted a pistol. Shocked, he leaped all the way up and his hand went for his sidearm on instinct as he watched her aiming for something behind him. Someone he'd stepped in front of.

A bullet streaked into his upper right chest. He could feel the pierce, the screaming burn, the exit and the sense of something flying away with it. The music and the singing—Bones's beautiful singing—continued for a second longer, until the sound of the gun's discharge registered.

Booth's right hand had his service weapon out but he couldn't lift it because his muscles refused to work. Screaming and general chaos erupted and Brennan's song stopped and he realized this was serious. He couldn't draw his next breath. His gun slipped free, the other hand grasping for the table beside him as adrenaline warred with panic and he couldn't get his damn lungs to work. Every attempt filled him with agony and failure.

There was a burning in his chest and a flurry of movement behind him. He sensed her, heard her shout his name. Knees bending and legs folding, he felt himself going down and Brennan reaching him too late to catch anything but she was bending over him a moment after his head slammed onto the ground.

How a situation could change so rapidly was a fact Brennan had frequently experienced and yet would never really understand. One moment she was singing, filled with joy; the next there was a _crack!_ And Booth's body twitching and music stops and screams start and his hand has a gun that he can't hold onto and that woman—Fat Pam, who isn't literally lipids but merely overweight and prone to giving socks and midnight raids in lingerie—is holding a gun. And she looks surprised.

And Booth isn't moving, isn't standing on his own, and Brennan is moving before she really understands what's happened because instinct tells her to get to him but too late to catch him or stop him from hitting his head on the edge of the stage.

Amid the chaos that surrounds her, Brennan's eyes laser down to see blood and a ragged hole in Booth's pectoralis major, the jagged edge of a transected third rib on Booth's right (what is under that, frantically she tries to recall, lung tissue and three lobar arteries and maybe the pulmonary vein but how close) and his dazed eyes blinking like he doesn't quite understand what's happened either.

And he's scared, trying to breathe and she knows already what it means because he can't, there's air going in the wrong way and pushing down, squeezing in the wrong way and out the wrong way and he's in pain, excruciating pain because his muscle is torn and his rib is broken and his lung has collapsed. _Sucking chest wound_, Cam had called it once, medical slang for tension pneumothorax. And the broken end of the rib is making things worse and there's blood, so much blood already and movement in the periphery of her vision.

Brennan turns to see the threat, the source, the danger and Booth's gun is there. She doesn't even think. It's in her hand and discharging, speeding towards Pam to bore a perfect red hole into the center of her throat, silencing her and killing her before she can move, before she will ever fully understand what's happened.

There was blood and gasping, from him and from her as she pressed her palms over the wound and tried to reassure them both. "Booth, you're gonna be fine. I'm right here. Come on."

Hodgins was shouting about 911.

"You can do this, you're gonna be fine." It wasn't a promise, it was a wish. A heartfelt plea. Please be fine, please don't, please don't let it be as bad as she already knew it was. Someone was calling 911, help and hospitals, all he had to do was hold on. She pressed harder, knowing first aid for this was to stop the intake of air through the wound so his lung would not collapse any further. "You can make this, come on. Come on, Booth!"

Like she's cheering him in a race. Like her pleas will make a difference.

He's still dazed, still whiter than chalk and turning blue and grey from hypoxia and his eyes aren't focusing on her but on some distant point behind her. He's fading.

Hysterically she hears herself screaming, begging him to keep trying, but her mind is chanting to keep breathing, please, _please,_ **_please_** don't leave, don't die. Please. She doesn't know what else to do so she pushes her arms under his shoulders, pulling him up into a desperate embrace, cheek pressed to his. Her own heart and lungs are being crushed by terror because she can feel him leaving.

He's limp. He's gone, his eyes closed and Cam is there with a box of clear plastic wrap that she's clumsily trying to tear out. She gently rolls Booth to check for an exit wound and sets the plastic tightly over the both the exit and entrance wound, sealing them. A moment later Cam is the one who is pulling her back. "Let the medics," she says, hoarse and barely in charge of herself. Cam loved him, too. Angela is pale and shaking, Sweets looks green, Brennan wonders why everyone is changing colors and even she is because her hands are red.

There's blood on her hands, there's blood on the floor, there's blood on Booth.

It was Angela who pulled her away and made her go out of the room. "Brennan. The medics need to work on him. Come on, sweetie."

Brennan barely registered Angela's words or the gentle tug on her arm. She could only stare at her partner's ashy face, at the medics checking his pulse and respiration, rapidly setting up an IV line until she couldn't see anymore. Angela had pulled her into the ladies room. Brennan looked around, dazed, not understanding why she was there. It was only when Angela ran the tap and forced her hands into the sink that she understood: her hands were smeared with blood. His blood. She felt her knees going weak—for a moment she wasn't sure she'd be able to keep standing.

"We're going to the hospital right after this," Angela promised. "Jack and I will take you."

Brennan nodded, unable to speak.

~Q~

"I'm sorry," he was saying. A man in blue, with spatters of something like chocolate syrup on the front of his shirt. He was telling her what she already knew: Booth was shot and suffered penetrating trauma to his chest that had resulted in a tension pneumothorax. He had gone into shock. Despite all their efforts, the doctors were not able to save him.

And he died.

That's where what she knew blinked off, like a candle blown out.

And he died.

Brennan stared straight into his eyes, nodding at the appropriate points. Yes, she understood. Thank you. Could she see him?

Well, no, because he'd died.

But she wanted to see him.

No, she couldn't see him, came the reply. It was a homicide; his body was being prepared for the Medical Examiner's office.

Because he was dead.

She protested. Cam overruled her. Dr. Camille Saroyan, the Forensic Pathologist, was the one who reminded her that there were procedures to follow, even when it came to their closest friends. But she needed to see him, to verify his findings of death, that irrevocable state of cellular decay, because nothing in her experience had prepared her to believe without evidence. "I need to see him."

"I'm very sorry, that just isn't possible."

The doctor turned, retreated behind the double doors that separated her from … from…. She couldn't even think it, what he was to her. The words wouldn't even form inside of her head because the concept of dead was finally getting through. Dead. Not alive. No more coffee.

"I need to see him," she mumbled to Angela. "I need his bones."

Angela was crying, trying not to fall completely apart because she sensed Brennan was precarious. "They won't let you," she warned her friend.

"I need to see his bones. His skull. I need to see him." If he's dead, she can touch him. There's a buzzing in her ears, a soft whisper of sound that she hasn't heard in two years and it's haunting and familiar and she knows it will explain everything if she could just get to his bones.

Cam had pulled herself together with her usual graceful strength and now she laid a cautioning hand on Brennan's arm. "Doctor Brennan, Booth's body is being held pending an autopsy. You won't be allowed access."

"I need his bones," she insisted. "I'm a forensic anthropologist, they'll let me see his bones."

Across the waiting room, Dr. Lance Sweets looked up from his seat with keen interest. Brennan's insistence was eery and calm, almost rational despite how morbid the request actually was.

"Sweetie, let's go," Angela urged.

"Angela, I need his skull. I need to touch the bones. They'll tell me."

Sweets had gotten up, was walking toward her with brows furrowed and a puzzled air. "What will they tell you, Doctor Brennan?"

"Let me touch him, please." She was growing frantic as the possibility materialized and was taken away all at the same time. "He'll speak to me."

Unnerved by Sweets's intensity, Angela grabbed her by the arm, pulling her away before Brennan blurted out too much in her unthinking grief. "Come on, we're taking you home."

~Q~

She sat in the back seat of Hodgins's car. Hands twisting in her lap, eyes unfocused, face turned blankly to the window, Brennan looked little more than a ghost. Angela wiped tears from her own eyes innumerable times during the 20 minute drive to Brennan's apartment, but Brennan's eyes stayed dry. The only hint of the turmoil going on under the surface was the pallor of her face, the tightness in her mouth. And the twisting, restlessness of her hands.

They parted at Brennan's door. Angela clung to her for several minutes, sobbing on her friend's shoulder. Brennan rallied long enough to comfort her, but was glad when she could escape into the silence of her home. Shut the door. Sink onto her knees on the floor and just stay there, her soul bleeding from the ragged hole freshly torn in it tonight.

She couldn't think. She couldn't feel. She couldn't move.

But she could hear it, a rushing wind chilling over her skin and crackling in her brain. Tears slowly carved a track down her cheeks, tears she didn't have the strength to wipe away. Tears that burned and bled and dripped in endless succession from her jaw onto her shirt and soaked into the cloth just as darkly as his blood had. His blood.

Moaning softly, she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to block out the image of him bleeding, of his fading eyes.

He was gone, dead. Vanished, no body, no Bones, no Booth. Just a pain that splattered inside, erupting through her eyes, shuddering in her chest, shutting out air as great, gulping sobs wracked her and a roar of white noise drowned out everything. She cried until exhaustion finally claimed her, dragging her into nightmarish sleep right there by the front door.

She woke on the floor two hours later, jerked into awareness by a jealous snarl and a _crack!_ and gasping, gurgling blood pouring over them, ripping him away from her.

Struggling to her feet, Brennan staggered through her living room, down the hall. She tore off her bloody clothes, threw them into the trash. She stepped into her bath and scrubbed herself violently, until her skin was raw and stinging so she stood under the shower until the water ran like ice over her back. Until her lips were blue and she shivered so strongly that she could barely stand but still the pain and stinging made her stand under the frigid water until she went numb.

She got dressed, gathered up some leftover case files she'd intended to get to this weekend, and left. At the street, she flagged a taxi and went to the Jeffersonian. It was just after midnight.

~Q~

The moment she entered the lab it had begun as a low humming, distant like a simmering beehive. As she crossed the open spaces and descended into Limbo, the hum grew louder, painful, separating into sounds of individual voices clamoring to be heard. She realized, with the slow sense of awakening one gets upon leaving a dream, this was a noise she'd not heard in two years.

Bypassing the examination tables, she followed the din until it pushed away every other sound and feeling, until nothing existed but the calls of the bones. She walked slowly through the aisles, pausing here or there, fingers sliding into boxes to touch the sound, to taste it tactilely and on the third aisle she found him. His bones groaned under the burden of what he had endured in life. She didn't even have to look: she knew already what she would find.

Brennan pulled out his drawer, heedless of date of arrival or any semblance of order. Taking the box back to the nearest examination table, she sorted and arranged his bones, fingers stroking over fossae and turbercles as if reuniting with an old love, long lost and recently restored. And the moment she connected with him, she heard it. A scuffed, crackling blare squalled inside her head as fingers closed over the callus of a remodeled nightstick injury. More ancient injuries squawked and scuffed, announcing their existence to her: broken arm; cracked rib (lower left floating rib number eleven, posterior, indicating a blow to the back); longitudinal fracture lines in his molars; hairline fractures to the maxilla and zygomatic. And an oblique fracture across the ascending ramus of the mandible that came from a powerful strike to the side of his jaw. Extensive, pre-adolescent physical abuse.

The skull grinned at her past its cracked teeth, showing bravado and confidence despite his brutal childhood. "You wouldn't let people see how much you were afraid. How much it hurt." The old injuries whispered their discontent but ultimately, he'd survived them. It was a different injury that had killed him; the gunshot wound that broke through his right, fourth anterior rib, puncturing a lung and possibly transecting a pulmonary artery was the injury that had ended his life. Death would have come fairly quickly, marked by blood and a struggle for air.

"Did it hurt?" she asked him as her tears streaked again, unchecked. He was in so much pain, he couldn't breathe. The static scrambling in her head almost seemed to hiss for a second, as if answering with a '_yes_.'

Poking a reverent fingertip into the small pit marring his rib, she felt the jagged edges of exposed trabecular bone. Blood welled up, staining her glove, puddling below. She heard rattling, hissing breaths and a groan. She saw brown eyes holding hers but then fading out. And with a small gasp of fear, she knew she couldn't tell if she was remembering what happened to Booth or imagining the fate of the unidentified man in front of her.

Recording the extensive injuries took time, took her away from last night and Brennan welcomed the distraction of this man's pain because it shielded her from her own.

~Q~

"Dr. Brennan, what are you doing here?" Cam stood in the doorway of Brennan's office at 7 am, surprised and concerned to see Brennan signing off on a Limbo ID so early on this particular morning.

"I couldn't sleep," Brennan found herself admitting. Her lips clamped shut before anything more revealing could squeeze through them.

Cam nodded, rubbing her hands over her arms. "Me either." She could see Brennan staring down at the papers on her desk, avoiding eye contact. Cam sighed, sensing her colleague's pain and not having the first clue how to reach her. Only Booth knew that. And Booth was gone. Blinking back tears, Cam turned away and worked on her own composure for a moment.

"If you need me, I'm in my office," she finally offered, knowing Brennan would never take her up on it.

Brennan nodded briskly.

Cam watched her for another long moment, then she walked away. There was nothing she could say that would make either of them feel better.

Alone again, Brennan's eyes crossed, the file she'd been trying to concentrate on blurred and rippled. She shook her head, trying to focus. Exhaustion from the all-nighter and stress dulled her mind just enough to make her consider using her couch to rest. Instead of doing that, she picked up her phone and dialed the office of the Northern District of Virginia's Medical Examiner. Formally, she offered her expert assistance on the recent homicide case involving an FBI agent, because she was the official anthropologist on retainer with the FBI. Surely they would prefer to have her involved with the investigation.

After that, she decided she would wait in Limbo until the Medical Examiner allowed her access to his bones.

~Q~

Modular Skeletal Storage, the place almost everyone called "Limbo," was an enormous storage room lined in boxes. Each box contained the bones and artifacts of a single, unidentified individual. Most of the people stored here were relatively recent, victims of homicides that couldn't properly be investigated until the victim was known. A few were historical remains requiring authentication, or accidentally disinterred burials who needed to be identified for reburial. The Jeffersonian had over 10,000 remains in storage on any given day—a waiting list of decades, in some cases. Most of the recent victims had to wait several years before getting their turn on the table; historical remains often waited longer still.

Over the next two days, Dr. Temperance Brennan managed to identify no less than 15 sets of human remains waiting for examination. She threw herself into the backlog of bodies long unclaimed, unknown. She barely stopped to eat and never considered sleeping beyond the hour here and there that she was forced to claim from the couch in her office. Even those few, scattered hours did not represent true rest, for no sooner did she close her eyes, but he was bleeding and gasping for air and nothing she did made the nightmare anything less than the nightmarish reality she'd already lived through.

Then her eyes would leak useless tears and something unseen would squeeze her chest until she fought for every breath. She'd lay in silent misery until the pain decreased and she could breathe again. Then she would get up and call the Medical Examiner's office to request access to Agent Seeley Booth's remains, only to be told her services weren't required. So Brennan had no recourse but to continue identifying bodies in Limbo.

~Q~

"How is Dr. Brennan doing," Cam asked Angela.

Looking up from a sketch she was half-heartedly working on, Angela could only sigh. "She's not doing well."

In the several days that had passed since Booth's death, talking to the forensic anthropologist had turned into an impossible endeavor. Brennan spent most of her time isolated, emerging from Limbo only when forced to by hunger or exhaustion. She answered the concerned inquiries of her friends with monosyllables uttered in a toneless voice. Angela knew Brennan was barely holding on but, like a wounded animal, she wouldn't let anyone close enough to help.

The main concern was that she was getting weaker. Her weight was dropping, her eyes dull, her skin waxy and pale. Brennan looked increasingly rumpled and lifeless and nothing seemed to reach her. Nothing, that is, except any mention of Booth. The utterance of his name sent the anthropologist recoiling with fury, but never tears, and then a retreat that would last for hours. When she emerged again, it was with the same lifelessness that was rapidly becoming Brennan's default state.

"I'm getting scared, Cam."

Meeting Angela's eyes, Cam acknowledged, "Me, too." Camille Saroyan had a knack with people, (perhaps not as finely developed as Seeley Booth's vaunted reading skills had been, but her ability to read people merited respect). She understood something was going on with Brennan that went deeper than grief and the apparent shell of aloofness she was hiding behind. Cam knew Angela was aware of that something and it was worrying her. Consequently, Angela's concern was the reason Cam was worried as well.

"You've never seen this side of her," Angela ventured.

Not such a pronounced coldness, no. Cam shrugged. "Well, she's always been pretty driven and obsessed with work."

"No, this is different," Angela explained. "The bones are speaking to her again. This is what she was like when I first met her."

"So you've seen this before?"

"Yes." Angela slapped her sketchpad onto the table and sighed tiredly. "This is what she was like before she met Booth."

Cam perched on the other end of Angela's sofa, curiosity nudging her to ask because something Angela had just said reminded her of the strange phone call she'd gotten from the Virginia Medical Examiner that morning. "Do you have any idea why Doctor Brennan is so concerned with examining Seeley's bones?"

"She wants to talk to him. She wants to hear him."

"She wants to talk to his bones..." That didn't sound rational and Cam couldn't quite believe Brennan would be inclined towards fantasy.

Angela leaned forward and repeated herself meaningfully. "The bones speak to her. You understand? She hears something when she touches them. She wants to hear Booth."

Cam believed in ghosts, knew she'd been visited by the ghost of her own mother. She also knew Temperance Brennan steadfastly refused to entertain the notion of disembodied spirits or an afterlife, and yet Angela was suggesting Brennan hoped to somehow communicate with a dead man through his bones. The juxtaposition sent shivers down her back. "She doesn't believe in ghosts."

"No, she doesn't," Angela agreed. "She has a scientific explanation for everything."

~Q~

"What are you doing here, Doctor Sweets?" Angela caught him skulking around Brennan's office, looking hesitant and yet determined.

"I was looking for Doctor Brennan."

"Why?" Brennan had complained about the shrink often enough for Angela to know they weren't chums and Brennan thought of him as little more than an obstacle to be avoided.

"I'm very concerned about her, that she might be suppressing her emotions regarding Agent Booth's death."

Suspicion narrowed her eyes. "And on what information do you base that assessment?"

"Well, from the way she conducted herself during her father's trial, for starters. Plus Doctor Saroyan informs me that Doctor Brennan has been working excessive hours and that she's been hounding the medical examiner for access to Agent Booth's body. That inappropriate focus is cause for concern."

Just to be sure he was truly in the dark she prodded, "That inappropriate focus on _work_."

Sweets tilted his head, assessing _her_ now. "Why else would she want access to Agent Booth's bones?"

"Why else, indeed?" Angela swept past him before he could read anything into what she did or didn't say. "Maybe you should try actually _speaking_ to her instead of speculating on hearsay."

~Q~

On the eighth day, Sweets cornered her while she was grabbing a reference book from her office. "Dr. Brennan, we should talk."

She paused, her body stiff with resistance. "Why?"

He looked at her in disbelief. "Because of Agent Booth."

Brennan lifted a shoulder. "He's dead and I'm no longer on retainer for the FBI."

Nodding, he looked at her curiously. "So I heard. Why is that?"

"Because the FBI won't let me do my job," she snarled. Someone from the FBI had instructed the Medical Examiner not to allow her to view Booth's body.

"I think you're being a little hasty," Sweets attempted. "We can talk about this."

"There's nothing to discuss." She turned to escape back into Limbo.

Sweets blocked her exit, forcing her to stop. "Of course there's something to discuss," he insisted. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm fine," she answered shortly.

"You sleeping okay," he pressed.

"Fine."

Sweets looked at her closely, noting the purple smudges below her eyes. "I think you're not telling me the truth. Have you been having nightmares?"

"I'm fine," she insisted, not meeting his eyes. "I need to get back to work."

Sweets nodded. "The funeral is in a couple of days," he pointed out. He watched her face for any flicker of emotion. Nothing showed itself. Her face was a blank, her eyes dull, her mouth tightly compressed into a thin line.

Hesitating a moment, he finally suggested, "Grief is easier to bear when we talk about it. You've suffered a loss—it's normal to feel angry, sad, hopeless, depressed, scared, regret. All of those feelings are very normal."

She shifted her quicksilver eyes towards him, spearing him with a gaze that cut like shards of broken glass. "There's nothing to talk about."

"But Agent Booth—"

"Is gone," she interrupted harshly. "Talking won't bring him back. Now if you'll excuse me, I have work to do."

She pushed past him and disappeared through the doors that he knew led to the Jeffersonian's vast basement. Sweets watched her go, heaving a sigh.

~Q~

John Doe #19960244 was laying in anatomical position on the second table in Limbo, his cleaned and slightly bleached bones whispering the first clues they'd waited so long to reveal. Brennan studied the cranium closely, noting the nasal opening was narrow and tall, while the anterior nasal spine was quite long. Taken together with the oval orbits, she was certain this skull belonged to a Caucasian. The blunt upper orbit borders and large muscle attachment areas indicated male. She made a few notes on the case file while filtering a thought that the bones had been ignored too long.

Half paying attention, she muttered, "I'm sorry, there was a long line ahead of you."

Consulting the case notes that came with these bones, she noted he'd been found half under a hollowed out tree in the Smokey Mountains. "How did you get out there?" Another pause, and she blinked, shook her head. It almost sounded like he'd spoken aloud.

"How long are you going to keep hiding down here?"

Brennan tensed, turning to see Angela leaning in the doorway. "I'm not hiding."

Angela pushed off the doorjamb and approached her friend, noticing the fraying around the edges that Brennan herself would never admit to. "You haven't been home since that night, have you." It was not a question.

"I do go home to shower and change clothes. But there's no reason to stay there. I have plenty to do here." Brennan was already back to examining the bones.

Quirking a skeptical brow, Angela surveyed the bones and the tension in Brennan's body. "So you won't have to face what happened? You can't avoid it forever."

Brennan's voice was muffled a little. "What makes you think I'm avoiding anything?"

Angela studied her more closely, suddenly beginning to worry that she'd waited too long to listen to what her instincts were telling her. "You're down here alone all the time, you won't talk to the new FBI liaison—"

"I've severed my relationship with the FBI," Brennan interrupted.

"—and yet I haven't seen you shed a single tear. The people who know you are starting to worry, and the people who don't know you are saying you don't feel anything."

Brennan's eyes remained fixed on the bones, on just one particular bone: the right distal femur. Something seemed a little off about it. She shrugged. "I don't care what people think."

Wincing, Angela bit her lip. She wasn't doing this right, but she had to keep trying even when it seemed like nothing was going to get through to her. "You're not cold, Brennan. I know you."

No reply.

"But you're not letting yourself grieve."

"Grieving is pointless. What's done is done." He whispered to her that his knees ached, so she soothed him. "I know they hurt." She picked up the femur, examining the distal end where it connected to the patella and lower leg bones. The lateral and medial condyles looked as though they had been scraped. She picked up the patella and observed matching scraping marks on the superior curve of its anterior and posterior sides. Something had cut just above the knee cap and curved downward behind it and out under the femur, severing the lower leg cleanly.

"We should talk about this. You need to talk to someone."

"Angela, you know I don't do that. I don't … talk."

Angela sighed. "Well, at least you can tell me why you're hiding down here."

"I'm not—" she began.

"You are, Brennan. You don't go home. You don't go into your office, you don't go onto the platform. You never leave Limbo. You've been down here alone for days. What is going on? What are you hiding from."

Her shoulders slumped. She turned slowly, letting Angela fully see her face at last, the pain etched into every feature. "I can't walk away from them again."

"Who can't you walk away from?"

"They're all asking me to look at them. I can't keep their voices straight. He's the loudest," and she gestured offhand toward the bones she was working on. "He doesn't like waiting and assures me there will be legal action taken if I don't..." she paused, as if suddenly realizing how insane it must be for a ghost to threaten to sue. "You can't sue me," she muttered and turned back toward the femur. "The lawyer wouldn't even be able to hear you."

Gasping, Angela suddenly realized with a chill that things were worse than even she had realized. Without even thinking, Angela closed the distance between them and drew her suffering friend into her arms. Brennan didn't cry, but her body felt as tightly drawn as a bow string. "Sweetie, you can't keep holding this pain inside you. You have got to let it out."

"I don't know how," Brennan admitted.

"Cry. Scream. Throw something. Or just talk to someone."

"I'm talking to you," she pointed out quite reasonably.

Angela laughed sadly. "No, you're letting me talk. There's a difference."

"It won't help. It won't change anything."

"You won't take care of yourself because it won't bring him back? Sweetie, Booth wouldn't want this. He'd want—" Angela bit her lip, feeling her own grief start to swamp her again. Shedding tears for Booth and Brennan both, she couldn't speak for a few moments.

"I really need to finish with this John Doe here," Brennan said quietly, ending the silence Angela was unable to fill. She turned back to studying the femur. "Your right leg was cut off in an unusual way—they carved around and behind the patella. It's a very difficult maneuver to make. Whoever dismembered you was quite skilled."

Groaning, grabbing hold of herself, Angela tried one last tactic. "When was the last time you slept?"

"This morning, a couple of hours in my office."

"No, I mean really slept. Like, more than five hours at a time."

Brennan shook her head.

"Okay, then. You need to go home and sleep. Really sleep."

"I'm fine," Brennan insisted. "He's tired of waiting and his knees hurt."

Oh God, she was _not_ fine. Angela wasn't sure if she was hallucinating or actually hearing ghosts. Either was a possibility and the only way to know for certain was to force her to rest. "You're exhausted. You're going to get sloppy and miss something." Angela gestured to the bones. "I know how much you hate that."

For the first time, Brennan hesitated.

Seeing the resolution weakening in her friend, Angela pressed her point. "Look, get some sleep and come back in 12 hours. You're going to need your strength for tomorrow."

"Why?"

"The funeral."

Brennan's eyes narrowed dangerously. "I'm not going."

"You have to!" Angela couldn't believe what she'd just heard.

"It's just a hole in the ground, an empty ritual. There's no point in going—it's not like he's going to know if I'm there or not." Her voice broke.

"Brennan—"

"No!" Throwing the femur back onto the table with a clatter, Brennan suddenly stiffened and turned to the skull. "Sorry. I forgot your knees ache." She stalked past her friend and all but ran up the stairs.

Angela could only watch her flee. Glaring at the skull as well, she snapped, "The last thing she needs is you making demands."

~Q~

* * *

Scientific Notes: Sleep deprivation actually is a well-documented source of hallucinations. In her more rested state, Brennan would probably insist that's what's going on. ;)

Information regarding injuries from blunt force trauma from articles titled _Blunt Force Trauma_, and _Skeletal Evidence of Torture_, both are chapters in Skeletal Trauma: Identification of Injuries Resulting from Human Rights Abuse and Armed Conflict, by Erin H Kimmerle and Jose P Baraybar, CRC Press, 2008.

Further information regarding gunshot wounds to the chest came from eMedicine, _Penetrating Chest Trauma Treatment & Management, _emedicine _dot_ medscape _dot_ com _slash_ article _slash_ 425698-treatment as well as from _Variation in Gunfire Wounds by Skeletal Region_, by Taipale et al, published in War or Health? A Reader, London, 2002.

All mistakes are mine.

Author's Note: It's midterm season again. As if that weren't bad enough, I've taken on the challenge of tutoring ELL students in Anatomy & Physiology. Between helping them prepare for exams and keeping up with my own classes, writing is getting pushed aside. It's going to be much harder for me to find time for writing over the next six weeks. Secondary stories are on the back burner and thank you notes have been delayed (but I am determined to get to them all). This story is the top FF priority but delays may happen during the next few weeks until things settle down at school.


	28. The Truth and the Tempest

Author's Note: In the real world, a man who was shot two weeks previously, nearly died from blood loss and a collapsed lung, and had likely suffered a broken shoulder blade probably would not be capable of aiming a rifle (they are _heavy_) let alone running, tackling and fighting a fully grown suspect. In reality, Booth would barely be walking on his own! I'm stuck with canon, which means Booth will do what the Show had him doing, but he's going to suffer some consequences from exerting himself too much.

A note for _jsboneslover_: You are correct. Thank you for pointing out that Brennan wouldn't mistake Booth's bones for anyone else's. That was an error in my writing where I did not make myself clear. I've gone back and corrected it to better explain what she didn't know when she 'saw' Booth's face. Constructive criticism is really helpful. :)

* * *

~Q~

~The Truth and the Tempest~

~Q~

**My reason, the physician to my love, angry that his prescriptions are not kept, hath left me. **

_William Shakespeare, Sonnet CXLVII_

~Q~

Once upon a time, Seeley had questioned her decision to take this job as head of Forensics at the Jeffersonian's Medico-Legal unit. "It's like herding cats, and you're a dog person."

She'd joked that dogs herd cats, but these cats were much too fast and clever for any kind of cornering. Ultimately, she'd had about the same level of success one might expect if they'd sent a wolf to herd cheetahs. In other words, she chased her tail while the cheetahs scattered and did as they pleased. So Cam had long ago given up any notions of ruling her domain as the alpha dog, settling instead for the indulgence of at least being kept informed of the goings on so she would not be blindsided by the Board of Directors when they demanded to know why the 'Ookie' room needed to be repainted for the fourth time (this year).

With that understanding in place, Cam kept one eye on safety and matters of practical concern, the other eye on the budget and left to their own devices, her team of genius cheetahs brought in the results that made the Jeffersonian's reputation ... colorful.

Over the last two weeks, she'd come to the uncomfortable realization that something quite profound was happening right under her nose, something Angela had hinted at and she'd sensed, and it swirled around the death of her old friend, the grief of her pseudo-employee, and the far too curious interest of a youthful FBI psychologist who should not have any interest in her employees at all. He kept coming around in search of her anthropologist, asking questions and generally making a nuisance of himself.

And here he came again. Doctor Lance Sweets accosted her in her office on the day of Seeley's funeral, insisting he needed her help in ensuring Doctor Brennan's presence at Arlington that afternoon.

"Why?" Cam lifted herself away from her desk, facing him with more than a little suspicion. This seemed wholly inappropriate if not downright odd, because attendance at a funeral was a personal decision that belonged to Brennan alone. Even if it was Seeley Booth and even if her refusal to go struck everyone around her as strange.

"I don't believe she has accepted the reality of his death," Sweets answered. "Her obsession with viewing Agent Booth's body speaks of an inability to accept the truth."

Narrowing her eyes, Cam reminded the psychologist of a rather obvious oversight. "From her point of view, Booth vanished. He was injured and his body disappeared. She's been told he died, but she's not been permitted any access to proof."

A tinge of pink colored his all but still downy cheeks. "I realize that, Doctor Saroyan. That is why I believe it to be in Doctor Brennan's best interests to attend the funeral, so she can obtain that proof and experience the closure of burial."

"She doesn't want to go."

"Of course she doesn't," Sweets replied in a tone that made Cam want to give in to a rather sophomoric urge to stuff him into a locker. "It means facing emotions she'd rather deny."

If Angela was right, Brennan was suffocating under the weight of emotions she _could not_ deny, and if Sweets thought Brennan had somehow managed to evade her own grief, it just showed what little he knew about the anthropologist he was so keenly interested in. Angela had an entirely different explanation and after this morning, Cam was fully inclined to believe the artist was right.

Something had changed in Brennan. Though she had no explanation for it, Cam had personally witnessed the remarkable transformation that had taken place in the anthropologist just since yesterday. Angela had argued with her several times until she'd finally succeeded in dragging Brennan to her own apartment and had forced her to sleep so she would be able to face his funeral fully functioning. When Brennan returned to the lab that morning, Cam had watched her with something akin to awe.

Brennan was ... beautiful.

Don't get her wrong, Cam was only ever into men, absolutely and without a doubt she firmly played with and preferred the boys. But she could objectively appreciate beauty in other women and overnight Temperance Brennan had somehow become infused with a fragile, glowing beauty that almost seemed divine. Angela was standing beside her when Brennan came in and Cam heard the artist gasp. Wordlessly Angela vanished into her office and returned almost instantly to sit back by Cam's office with a pad and oil crayons. She brushed her own tears away and started sketching.

Angela drew Brennan, capturing the essence that had first drawn her into their remarkable friendship. Cam didn't know anything about art but she could see it taking form under Angela's swiftly moving hand, the feelings that Brennan evoked in all of them somehow rendered in smears of bleeding colors as if the paper itself had tried to brush away its tears. Hodgins watched her quietly from a shadowed doorway, his throat working convulsively from what he felt and had no words that would suffice. Zack, the former student who still worshiped his mentor, gently offered Brennan a place beside him where he was examining a recent arrival from France, centuries-old remains needing authentication.

Cam watched them all and knew something was happening, something she didn't understand yet. She turned to Angela and wondered aloud why just looking at Brennan made her want to cry.

"That's Tempe." Seeing that Cam was one of them now, Angela asked gently, "Do you remember that day you threatened to fire her and I warned you we all would leave with her if you did?"

Oh God, quite ruefully she acknowledged that she remembered that and the fact that she'd never really uncovered the reason why.

As if she knew what Cam still wondered, Angela explained. "This is why. Once you see Tempe..."

It was no explanation at all and yet Cam understood exactly what she meant. She felt it, too, that her fate had been sealed and she would forevermore remain a loyal friend to Temperance Brennan. This vision was the secret that united them all... "But why haven't I seen this before?"

Angela looked up from her sketchpad, watching Brennan with sorrow. "You only see her when she's broken."

Brennan was broken.

They all could see it, Angela, Hodgins, Zack, and now Cam. Brennan had broken under the weight of her grief and thus Dr. Sweets trying to tell Cam that Brennan wasn't feeling things rang as false. Booth had vanished and Brennan had focused her energy on recovering him, and when she was stymied on that, she fell prey to a near-psychic connection with the bones of the bodies waiting in Limbo. She was going to get lost in Limbo unless they all intervened.

Maybe Sweets had it half right. Before Brennan could begin to mend, she needed her partner to return from the status of missing. Cam's realization that Brennan did need evidence of Booth's death was the only reason she agreed to help Sweets pressure her into going to the funeral. When they went to confront her, Cam received even more evidence that Angela was right, and that overnight Cam had truly become one of them.

Brennan and Zack were still huddled over the remains from Provence, conferring quietly on isotope findings that confirmed time since death and location in life. Hodgins gently reminded her it was time to leave, but Brennan spoke to Zack as if she'd heard nothing at all. "The metacarpal-phalangeal joints are smooth, showing dexterity. Perhaps a musician."

Cam stepped forward, using her lupine authority to draw Brennan's attention away from the ancient skeleton. "That's enough. We're going. Now."

And Brennan replied quite nonsensically, given what she'd confirmed a moment ago about the length of time this man had been dead. "I have remains to identify. He could have a family."

A chill swept over Cam as Brennan spoke about a five hundred year old skeleton the same way they discussed a victim who had died last year. As if he were a real person still despite the passage of centuries. As if his bones were speaking to her right then and she must answer to them. _"The bones speak to her. You understand?"_ Yes, now she did. When Brennan was broken, the bones came alive to her and that was why she wanted Booth's bones.

Unfazed because she was far more familiar with this, Angela sighed and remarked acerbically, "He's 500 hundred years old. They've probably adjusted by now."

_"I need his bones. Let me touch him, please. He'll speak to me."_ They'd all heard her say that at the hospital, two weeks ago. The members of Brennan's Jeffersonian family all understood exactly what was happening. Only Dr. Sweets was still in the dark, still outside the circle, but he'd seen enough of her to want inside.

~Q~

In the black Lincoln Town Car Hodgins had arranged for her to take with Angela, she watched the giant statues of the Iwo Jima monument blur past her on the way to Arlington National Cemetery where Seeley Booth would be buried with full military honors. She'd come here with him before, a bright afternoon with gleaming white headstones surrounding them while he fumed over desecration and later confessed his blackest moments among the white blades that marked the deaths of soldiers. He would have appreciated being buried here, but she did not. The fact that he was going to be so close (only fifteen minutes by car) did not console because the only thing Brennan could think was that she was about to face the reason she had refused to attend, the finality she didn't want to face.

The only thing she'd wanted since the moment his death stole her life was to touch his bones, to hear his whispers emerge from calcium salts. To see his face float over his skull. For ten days she had waged a telephone campaign with the Virginia ME and then the FBI, a losing battle to let her see him one last time so she could have the proof of his death. So she could say good bye and maybe hear what he would tell her through his whispering bones. The battle lost, the spoils went to the victor—in this case his bones, which had been placed into a locked casket and would shortly be lowered into the ground.

The thought of it squeezed air out of her lungs, collapsing them just as his had. She couldn't imagine where she would get the strength to stand there and watch her only link to Booth disappear into the earth. She was angry, blistering hot with fury over the loss. The waste. The noise. The pain. The denials and the fact that she was here and he wasn't and she didn't want to be where he wasn't.

Fleetingly, she wondered if they would let her go into the ground with him.

Only later, much later, did she realize how many details she'd missed in her thriving fury when Angela tugged her out of the car. Brennan's angry eyes swept the black-clad crowd, noting quite a few agents from the FBI and only later—in hindsight—did her brain supply the missing information that she should have noticed immediately.

Cullen wasn't there.

Rebecca wasn't there.

Parker wasn't there.

His brother and grandfather weren't there.

Angela positioned them close to the casket, almost close enough to pass as family. Brennan crossed her arms and felt her body vibrating with the tempest, the pain and grief at war with her burning wrath over what was about to happen. How much she hated the FBI just then, for their refusals to let her near him. How much she hated that casket, sealing him off and away.

How much she hated being this close and not able to get any closer and this was the last chance—which really was _not_ a chance but only a torment like Tantalus reaching for the fruit only to have it ripped from her grasp—and she was filled with hatred for all of it.

And for Dr. Sweets, with his dark probing gaze that poked like fingers into her bloody psychological wounds. "I'm glad you came, Doctor Brennan, you need this closure."

But his lips were pulling into an odd twist that spoke of anticipation, of brimming excitement, and if she wasn't so damn angry she might have wondered why he cared so much that she got 'closure.' What did that mean? Shutting eyes, slamming lids, bones buried in the closed up earth.

He was watching her, brows furrowed as if puzzled and lips twitching as if with half-hidden glee and she was too angry to give him the satisfaction of reacting. She looked through him like window glass, letting the heated coals of anger carry her through the ordeal ahead.

The custom to give speeches of praise at the death of a loved one derives from ancient Greece, from the custom of giving funeral orations known as epitaphs. Booth might have preferred a well-written epitaph, especially its structure. After the orator insisted no words existed to properly describe the heroic deeds of the deceased, he would then proceed to explain Booth's lineage (hopefully leaving out the John Wilkes leaf from the family tree), followed by Booth's exploits in battle, his sacrifice for the United States, and finishing with gratitude and consolation for the family and friends who were left behind. Even the modern word Eulogy is from Greek, _eu_ + _logos_, meaning "a good word."

Brennan sat through each awkwardly worded speech given by fellow FBI agents who clearly did not know Booth all that well and gnawed her lip at the injustice of it. They spoke of his prowess on the rifle range but not of his compassion in the homes of survivors of violent crime. They spoke of his ease in conning criminals into confessions, but not of his knack for comforting friends and strangers through their darkest moments.

The only eulogy she bothered to pay attention to was the one given by Caroline Julian. The portly woman, fierce and intractable in her own way, strode up to the head of the grave and delivered her words with all the force of a bulldozer and it was the well-educated US Attorney who finally gave Booth his oration. His epitaph, quick and quirky. New Orleans style.

"I knew Seeley Booth. He was a good man who earned my respect and affection, and I don't like many people. Booth had a selfless commitment to his work, first in the military, and then the FBI."

It might have been fine but for Caroline's grim reminder of why they were there. "Two weeks ago, he made the ultimate sacrifice, giving his life to save his partner."

Brennan, who was already tense, now stiffened and visibly recoiled from the reminder, from the images flashing in her mind of bleeding and gasping and chocolate eyes growing hazy with hypoxia. Her own breathing accelerated as a sense of entrapment closed her in on all sides. She didn't want to be here; she didn't want to hear this. She didn't want to watch him go into the ground.

Caroline continued, "And in that brave act, he showed us what greatness we are all capable of."

She didn't want him to do it, leave her here to suffer alone. If they hadn't crossed his lines, he wouldn't have done it. There were too many wild things clawing inside her, guilt and grief, rage and regret and red, raw agony.

When she was in Limbo, the voices of the bones pushed this all aside. When she worked with Zack, unassuming Zack who never asked, never pressed, never expected, then she could contain these other, ugly emotions that were scratching to get out. The walls of whispers were gone, leaving her at the mercy of the internal pressure and the containment failed. She couldn't keep it in. "That woman was aiming at me. I would have happily taken that bullet."

She would have died for him.

Angela quieted her with a touch. "I know."

Caroline stepped forward to place a red rose on the coffin. "May God's mercy and love shine on Seeley Booth as he takes his place beside the Lord."

She couldn't keep it in, couldn't contain the growing tangle of fury and pain, the senselessness of his death and the suggestion that his painful end was the result of some divine master plan just added another layer to the mass rapidly going critical inside of Temperance Brennan. "If there were a merciful God, why wouldn't he have saved Booth?"

At a signal from the chaplain, a marching drum beat sounded as the honor guard prepared for the Twenty One Gun salute (which in reality is seven guns shot three times in succession) and Brennan wondered at the source of this tradition as a means of distracting herself from the insult to memory that was about to occur: more gunshots. More reminders of what had stolen him from her.

The Master of Arms issued his crisp orders. "Stand by. Port arms."

In perfect synchrony, the honor guard lifted their rifles up, perpendicular to the ground and held steady for the next command.

"Ready." The rifles were cocked in unison.

"Aim." They leveled the guns into position for firing and again awaited the command to fire. Brennan tensed her body for the cracking shots, for the sound of gunfire that had taken his life, but it didn't happen.

Instead, a man who had been hanging back behind the crowd had now stepped towards the coffin bearing a flower. Suddenly, one of the honor guards dropped his rifle and charged forward, knocking people aside as he rushed the unknown man.

"Excuse me! Hey!" The rogue guard shouted in a voice strangely familiar.

Seeing the ruckus, the Master of Arms exclaimed, "Hold your fire!" and the six remaining members of the honor guard stood down as instructed while the tussle in front gained everyone's attention.

The mysterious man pulled a pistol. The uniformed honor guard lost his cap, revealing that he was someone entirely unexpected.

Brennan stood frozen for a second as familiar structures blazed into her consciousness, as the impossible became possible. As a vanishing body and FBI stonewalling suddenly had context, as the absence of Parker and Jared and those features and that voice she knew so well all suddenly came together into a probability that was wonderful and terrible, both at once.

Angela gasped. "What the hell is going on?!"

Zack's mild understatement might have been amusing in less fraught circumstances. "They appear to be fighting."

The final clue was provided by the fight itself, when one of the duelers fell against the casket and knocked it off its stand. The lid fell open, revealing a weighted dummy inside. And it all came together in a blinding flash of understanding, the whole truth.

He's not dead. He was never dead.

He's there fighting but he must be weak because a perforated lung and broken scapula is not something you just bounce back from and the man he's fighting—whoever he is—is lunging for a dropped gun and Temperance Brennan is _damned_ if she will watch him get shot again. So she grabs a fractured manikin arm and swings it like a bat right at the assailant's face. _Slam!_

He's down.

Booth is safe.

Booth.

She's breathing hard, a genius struggling to understand. She's never felt like this, she doesn't even know what it is. There are no words, only vicious confusion that is snarling. Where the hell has he been?! Why was she lied to? Why is his family missing? Why is he grinning at her like that, like he's delighted and surprised to see her?

"Bones! Nice shot!"

Doesn't he _know_? Doesn't he know what _hell_ she's been living in? Doesn't he hear it even here, the noise of the graves, all those bones whispering now, all her pain exploding outwards into relief fanning rapidly back into an entirely different rage by the growing realization that he's fine enough to fight but not to tell her he's _not dead_.

And he _is_ delighted to see her. For all the time he was recovering in hiding, Brennan and Parker were the people he missed the most. The last thing he remembers from before getting shot was how beautiful Bones was, watching her sing and jump around with joy, the light in her eyes. She's even more beautiful now, almost luminous, yet she most distinctly does not look happy to see _him_.

"What," he asks, feeling the first stirrings of doubt as he realizes she is … dangerous.

Now he's seeing Tempe in her full blazing glory, her eyes glimmering like moonstones as she approaches. He's never seen her like this, incandescent as an avenging angel, beautiful and terrifying. She's stalking towards him with lightening in her eyes, thunder in her clenched jaw and grinding teeth, all the power of the heavens raging in her.

And she's going to kill him.

There's a reason the Bible speaks of the terrible beauty of angels, there's a reason mortals tremble before God's messengers. He's paralyzed by her glory as she pulls back her fist and it flies towards him like the hammer of Justice. She strikes him down with a single blow, steps over him to fly away on wounded wings, and he finds himself surrounded by a thunderstruck crowd.

Angela's glare splashed him with pure acid before she dashed off after Brennan. Zack watched with bemused confusion. Hodgins was trembling in excitement and awe over a side of his colleague he'd never seen before. Sweets stood with the most curious expression of all, watching Brennan rush away with a potent mix of reverence and terror.

It was Camille Saroyan who still had enough presence of mind to reach down a hand and lift him up, her ordinarily warm eyes frosted over. "What the hell is going on, Seeley?"

He wanted to tell her not to use that name but his jaw ached where Bones nearly broke it and his chest clenched with pain and his right shoulder was screaming. "They faked my death," he managed to gasp as his pain mounted. He realized he'd pushed it, done too much.

She saw he was flagging and furiously grabbed his arm to escort him to a car. "Is that why Parker and Jared and Pops aren't here? Because they knew this was fake?" She opened the door to a Town Car and roughly shoved him in.

"Probably. Why is Bones so mad?"

Cam climbed in and slammed the door. "Why the hell do you _think?_"

She didn't know? It slowly came to him, understanding and then dread because he would have to face her. "She was supposed to know." Breathing was difficult again, like it had been off and on during the past week. He knew he'd over-exerted himself and he was going to pay with pain for hours.

"Well clearly she didn't," Cam snapped. "None of us knew. We thought you were dead."

"I'm sorry," he groaned.

"What the hell, Seeley. You vanished and they told us you were dead. Do you have any idea what that did to her?" _Or what that did to me? _And she felt tears springing to her eyes as well as an impulse to simultaneously embrace and strangle him._  
_

Grounding herself with practical concerns, Cam gave the address of the Jeffersonian to the driver and turned to stare out the window while taking a minute to process what she felt and what she'd seen. If she was this angry and confused, it was no doubt a vastly weaker version of what Brennan must be experiencing. Everything that had gone on with Dr. Brennan over the last two weeks came surging forward and yet she could not reconcile the haunted ghost of Brennan with the fully living, fire-breathing version she'd seen just a moment ago. "I've never seen anything like this."

"I have," Booth grunted, shifting and trying to find a comfortable position that wouldn't put any further pressure on his aching chest and arm, not to mention his jaw or the roiling nausea consuming his guts. He hurt everywhere and the thought of facing Bones again in ten minutes just unnerved him. He asked Cam to take him home instead.

Swiveling her head to gape at him, Cam found her voice had risen more than an octave. "Are you kidding me?!"

So he went to the Jeffersonian and faced the wrath of Temperance Brennan instead.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: At the beginning of Pain in the Heart, Brennan gives a singularly strange line. She says, "I have remains to identify. He could have a family" only moments after declaring those remains have been dead for 500 years and everyone just shrugs it off as completely normal...

Thanks to everyone who is reading. :)


	29. The Viper in Their Midst

Author's Note: First, the lyrics below belong to Social Distortion, from the song Booth was playing in his bathroom: _Bad, Bad Luck_. Kudos to the Bones Music Editor for choosing that song because it really resonates with what Brennan is going through in this episode.

Second, thank you to everyone who is reading this story and for sharing your thoughts with me when you feel moved to. To show my appreciation, one thing I try to do for you all is to present you with something unique. Something a bit unexpected, to make reading this story worth your while.

* * *

~Q~

~The Viper in Their Midst~

~Q~

**"...Whatever cunning fiend it was**  
**That wrought upon thee so preposterously**  
**Hath got the voice in hell for excellence:**  
**All other devils that suggest by treasons**  
**Do botch and bungle up damnation**  
**With patches, colours and with forms**  
**Being fetch'd from glistering semblances of piety:**  
**But he that temper'd thee bade thee stand up,**  
**Gave thee no instance why thou should'st do treason,**  
**Unless to dub thee with the name of traitor..****."**

_Henry V, Act II, Scene 2_

~Q~

"Sweetie," Angela began as soon as she caught up to Brennan, which wasn't as easy as it sounded even though Angela usually could match Brennan's long stride. "Brennan, will you slow down?"

"No." The abrupt refusal sailed back and Brennan sallied forth at an even faster clip. "I'm not staying here."

The car's scorching interior engulfed her, and Angela followed her in before Brennan could shut her out. "Where are you going, then?"

"Back to work. I never should have left."

"Yes, you should have," Angela corrected gently. "If it was real..."

"It wasn't real," she snarled. Brennan blinked back tears, bit her lip fiercely, struggled for composure. "I don't want to talk right now, Angela."

"I know. But you're going to have to face him."

"Why wasn't his family there," she demanded instead. "They _knew_. He told them but not me."

Angela knew she was somewhere very far away from being a genius, but for once her own thoughts might be clearer than her friend's were. Drawing Brennan's resisting body into a comforting embrace (that lasted only until she spoke), Angela tried to inject some logic into the conversation. "Booth would never hurt you on purpose. There must be a reasonable explanation."

That's what made her pull away. "I never want to see him again."

Sighing, Angela reminded her of opportunities lost and found. "Ten minutes ago you would have given anything to see him again..." Brennan's eyes glowed at her (or was it glowering? sometimes even Angela wasn't sure) so she pushed ahead. "You've got him back, Bren. Let him explain."

~Q~

As Cam dragged Booth away and a distant door slamming heralded Dr. Brennan and Angela's departure, Zack turned to see several FBI agents swarming the man Booth had tackled and Dr. Brennan had felled with a manikin arm. Then he experienced a tug on his own arm as Hodgins briskly pulled him towards the last Town Car. "Come on, Zack."

"Where are we going?"

"We've gotta save Booth from Doctor B." He noted that his friend had curled one side of his upper lip into a strange little smile, almost like inappropriate happiness trying to sneak out unnoticed. Even Zack knew one did not smile at funerals, but this series of developments had certainly exceeded the limits of a conventional funeral.

Puzzled, aware that Dr. Sweets was scrambling up the small incline beside them, Zack was fairly certain Hodgins had exaggerated the risk his mentor posed to the large and robust FBI agent she worked with. "Doctor Brennan would not commit a crime of violence against Agent Booth." Especially not now, Zack reasoned, when she'd been so shattered by his (apparently feigned) death.

At the door, Hodgins turned to crow, "Are you kidding me? What do you call what just happened? You saw her take him down! Get those two alone together and who knows what she'll do next? We've gotta give him a fighting chance, not that he particularly deserves one."

Sweets actually looked a bit pale at this declaration. "You don't seriously think..."

Diving into the car, Hodgins tossed back, "Unless he has like, the best explanation ever, she's not going to forgive him. I love Doctor B, but _dude_ ... once you get her temper boiling that woman can hold a grudge. You remember, Zack? The last time he pissed her off so bad she hit Booth?"

"Oh..." Zack deliberately increased the speed at which he entered the car. One might describe it as nearly frantic scrambling as the thought of repeating history took hold. He was pretty certain Agent Booth still had not truly forgiven _him_ for the two hundred twelve different times he'd had to take a message during that year when Dr. Brennan refused to speak to him.

"What? She's hit Booth before?" Sweets took in this news with keen interest as he piled in as well and the driver asked for a destination.

"A long time ago," Hodgins dismissed. "Their first case. I don't know what went down but she hit him and refused to speak to him for a year. The point is, unless we get her side-tracked enough to let her cool down, he's going to say the wrong thing and this time she may never speak to him again."

Agreeing with Hodgins' urgency, Zack quickly supplied the Jeffersonian's address and urged the driver to expedite their journey.

"What?"

"He means hurry the hell up," Sweets snapped, suddenly gripped by fear of what might explode between his patients if they didn't get there in time.

Settling back into his seat, Zack ran his agenda against this new development. It had been abandoned during the last two weeks already, the plan entirely scrapped after that night at the Checkerbox. Watching over Dr Brennan had taken first priority, and it still did because she was very important.

Zack calculated that Dr Brennan was important because she was a Master too, his first Master whom he had gratefully served. She'd taught him how to read the bones that so interested the man who had offered to become his new Master. She'd taught him the importance of justice and seeking the truth.

Zack had known he could not serve two masters, had known he would have to sever one of the apprenticeships at some point. Even though it pained him to do it, he had prepared the plan that would take him out of her service and two weeks ago he was poised to put it into action, but had stalled at the last moment. He'd stalled because he knew it would hurt her and he cared enough to hesitate even though that meant he was placing one woman above the multitudes.

Then Agent Booth was shot and they were told he'd died. Dr Brennan collapsed in upon herself, and he could not leave her in such a vulnerable state because ultimately she was more than simply his master. She didn't just teach him; he knew she'd come to love him, had given him a home in her lab and a place in her world, a metaphorical family that understood him better than even his own biological relatives did. The people surrounding her were all like a family and Zack understood how important family was.

They arrived at the Jeffersonian and tumbled out of the car only a few moments behind the others. Booth had caught up to Brennan and was hurriedly explaining something about a terrorist and national security, pursuing her all the way into the lab while she walked exceedingly fast and snapped out her lack of interest several times. Zack slipped away from the group and paused at the door to his work area, briefly torn by doubts.

It was only a question of timing. It had always been a question of timing, right from the moment of conception. He had carefully calculated the impact it would have, and fully comprehended the irrevocable nature of the plan. Once started, it could not be stopped. Zack was ever mindful of the greatest happiness, the least harm, the unstoppable progression once he started. He'd hesitated and stalled out of concern for the impact upon himself and the people he'd come to love as family.

Then Booth had died and the plan was abandoned.

But now...

Now Booth was back and they were falling apart. Zack reached for the box, carefully addressed to her in block printing. Slipped it into his palm and turned to rejoin the others. Returned to watch what unfolded and let events beyond his ken decide his fate. If it was necessary, if it would _help_, he would do it. He swallowed uncomfortably as Booth's passionate pleas increased in volume and Brennan's passion scaled back into glacial coldness.

"After I got shot, the Bureau faked my death so I could finally get that guy."

"I don't care," Brennan declared with breathless indifference.

Perhaps Hodgins was correct. She was too angry with Booth to forgive him even though Zack thought Agent Booth's decision had been completely valid and rational under the circumstances he'd described. If given enough time, Dr. Brennan's rational mind would undoubtedly agree that Booth had taken the wisest, most reasonable approach. Removing a dangerous terrorist who posed a threat to national security and dozens (perhaps hundreds) of lives certainly must take precedence over the temporary discomfort of a few employees at the Jeffersonian. Booth had made a logical decision: to maximize happiness and reduce suffering, one must act in terms of what will bring the greatest good for the greatest number. It was strict Utilitarianism though he guessed Booth probably was not aware of what it was called.

Agent Booth tried again. "Look, I drove him underground. He said the only way we'd ever see him again is at my funeral, so—"

And Dr. Brennan cut him off sharply, her voice chipping like ice. "I don't care." She kept walking, leaving him to slip and fall on the trail of ice in her wake. History did repeat itself. _"Tell him I'll speak to him when hell freezes over."_ She was shutting him out, just like she did so long ago._  
_

And they were all loyal to Brennan, all turning against Agent Booth, and if Hodgins was right it would reinforce Dr. Brennan's anger towards her partner. It would make her even more reluctant to forgive him, which meant they would not work together any longer. In turn, murderous criminals would escape, bringing greater risk and unhappiness to the public. Zack fingered the box tucked against his leg, still indecisive even as more of his friends were pulled into the fray. They were all coming unraveled.

Hodgins asked a question and Booth snapped at him. "What part of 'national security' don't you understand, Hodgins?"

"National security," Hodgins sneered. "Catch-all phrase for 'we can do anything we want.'"

Dr. Brennan lashed out at Booth again, verbally this time. "I knew I shouldn't have gone to that funeral. It was a complete waste of time, just like I said."

The arguing continued as Zack trailed behind, growing more worried and ever more torn by the price of acting on his principles. If he himself would be guided by strict Utilitarianism, then he must proceed with the plan _now_. Now, when it would do the greatest possible good. He drew a sharp breath in preparation.

Disgusted, Angela growled, "You guys are pathetic."

"Just know that I won't be attending your next funeral," Dr. Brennan declared.

And Zack winced as the barbs flew among them all. Everyone was fracturing, falling apart. His hand clenched the box tighter, until its hard, sharp corner dug into his increasingly moist palm. They were so busy fighting that none of them saw Zack slide the box onto a table in the corner, or turn and rub his hand uneasily against his thigh.

"Bones, I'm telling you: you were supposed to know that I wasn't really dead. I swear! That's why I thought you weren't crying."

And now Dr. Saroyan had entered the battle, siding with Dr. Brennan against her old friend. "Informed by who, exactly?"

"I gave a list of people to the Bureau to inform that I was not really dead. If they didn't tell you, it's not my fault."

Dr. Brennan flashed Agent Booth a glare that clearly pinned all the blame on him. Hodgins was right, they needed to save Agent Booth's partnership with Dr. Brennan for the sake of public safety.

When Dr. Sweets interjected his own observation, he merely introduced another source of agitation that further risked splitting them apart. "Dr. Brennan is actually upset because she had to face strong emotions that she'd rather deny." He turned to Brennan. "Striking Agent Booth indicated the depth of your feelings for him. It was a very passionate act."

"Thank you," Agent Booth snapped before turning back to his estranged partner, provoking her. "Did you hear that? _Passion_."

And when what Agent Booth said only served to reactivate Dr. Brennan's fury, Zack knew it was for the good of all of them. He had to do it. Zack returned to the box on the table a few feet away, paused to watch her with a sense of strengthening resolution. This was for their greater good.

"Yes! Passion! Because _anger_ is a passion. Anger at being _manipulated_!" She stepped into his space, hissing like a tigress and primed to slam another fist into his face. "Pretending to be dead—"

Agent Booth was giving up, turning away from her. "Aw, forget it. I'm not—"

Swallowing a last gulp of irrational fear, Zack set the plan in motion. "Doctor Brennan, someone left a package for you..."

~Q~

In the Bone Room, Zack watched Dr. Brennan turn the mandible very carefully. Her eyes were always so sharp, like a finely honed steel blade that took in every possible detail and sheered away anything that was not important. She would find it; that was why he knew there could only be one outcome now. Though she'd finally rested somewhat since the previous day, Zack noted Brennan's still pale skin and slightly hollow cheeks. The stress was taking its toll on her, and he knew it was only going to get worse now that the plan had been initiated.

"Doctor Brennan," he interrupted her softly. When she glanced up, Zack offered his opinion. "Agent Booth made an illogical decision."

Without a sound she returned to her examination but he knew she would listen if he continued speaking. "There are greater considerations than just one individual person. The opportunity to flush out a dangerous criminal could not be passed up or risked for the happiness of one person and yet, he left instructions with the FBI for someone to tell his family and you when he could not do so himself."

He watched Dr. Brennan pull in a sharp breath, her cheeks flushing, and he sensed that she was still angry. It would benefit her to redirect that anger. "The person entrusted with that message was the person who betrayed you both."

"It's not that simple, Zack." She put down the mandible, her fingers tracing over the gouges Zack had said were made by prosthetic teeth with waning interest. The bone lied under her fingers, whispering false promises just like its owner had and she couldn't muster empathy for the liar he'd been in life. False things like hasty promises and delayed funerals should not invoke strong feelings but she couldn't help feeling deceived.

"Yes it is," Zack persisted. "You should find out who that person is."

Brennan halted and stilled, lifting her gaze at last to find him waiting for her acknowledgment of the sensibility of his suggestion. Someone had betrayed Booth, someone he'd trusted to tell her. This wasn't a personal betrayal so much as a game of chess and she was just a piece to be moved and manipulated. Even the Queen is merely a piece in the larger game.

~Q~

So she went immediately. Since beginning to investigate the circumstances surrounding Zack's discovery of Gorgomon's mandible on the forensics platform, Brennan had not seen Booth. He'd spent the day away from her, maybe visiting Parker or resting after that morning's exertions, and she tried not to read anything into his intentional absence.

What Angela and Zack had each said ran through her mind on a repeating loop as she drove to Booth's apartment. She would have done anything to get him back, and he was back without her having to do anything but find a way to understand and forgive. Setting the events into context, she acknowledged that Booth had trusted someone to tell her and she could accept the possibility that it wasn't entirely his fault that person had failed him.

Zack was right: it really might be that simple.

When she got to the apartment door and knocked (it was almost ten that night) she heard music coming from the depths of the walls but no sounds of movement inside. Why didn't he answer? Conditioned over the last two weeks to now expect the worst where Booth was concerned, she was helpless against irrational worries that spilled into her mind and magnified minor risks into epic disasters. What if he'd re-injured himself? What if he was unconscious? What if she lost him again?

"Booth!"

Brennan knocked twice more, growing more anxious at the lack of response and her answering sense of panic. What if...?

Turning to go back outside, Brennan's bowed head allowed her eyes to see a brown lump tucked up against the door. It was supposed to look like sandstone, which is not indigenous to the Chesapeake region. She bent and touched another plastic object forging itself as authentic. A fake, plastic rock. (A plastic manikin in the coffin, Booth's fake funeral, but she wouldn't allow her brain to skip forward to fake anything else. Wait for evidence, wait for proof...) She lifted it and saw the hidden chamber, saw a key inside that matched the grooves on Booth's key that she'd watched him use on the front door so many times in the few weeks they'd begun having coffee together outside of work.

The key slid easily into the lock, turned the knob, opened the door. The music got louder, distorted. A singer complained very loudly from a back room.

_Some people like to gamble,_  
_ But you, you always lose._

"Booth?"

The lyrics followed her through the short hallway, into the small living room, around the dinette and into the kitchen.

_You gotta nasty disposition,_  
_ No one really knows the reason why,_  
_ You gotta bad, bad reputation,_  
_ Gonna hang your head down and cry..._

He wasn't in the living areas. She halted at the hallway, biting her lip, realizing she couldn't relax until she saw him but in order to do that she must go where she'd not yet been allowed. He'd always stopped at the third base. Brennan pushed aside any fear of offense and charged back to his bedroom, finally seeing it with a shimmer of sadness—because she was afraid he was hurt, that's why she was going in where he didn't allow her—and he wasn't there.

_You got bad, bad luck_  
_ Bad, bad luck_

The music was coming from his bathroom.

She hesitated at the door, but then pulled the pocket door just slightly, just enough to see.

_You're looking through a cracked mirror,_  
_ No one really knows the reason why._

As her eyes saw, as her mind processed, a blizzard of emotion scoured her skin and blinded her eyes, just like gritty, blinding snow. He was doing it again. She was worried, filled with pain and once again he was just fine. Booth sat taking a bath, relaxed with some magazine, while she drowned in insecurity and fear outside. Brennan turned away from the door, struggling to put a rational spin on the hurt.

He didn't know she was worried, right? He didn't know what she didn't know. But he also didn't care.

Blinking back further tears, she sat down on the edge of his bed and accepted the truth. Booth had been angry at the lab and had spent the rest of the day away from her. Now he was taking a bath like she didn't matter, making no effort to explain, showing no concern for what she'd been through.

Because he didn't care.

_Your enemies are gettin' nearer,_  
_ Gonna hang down your head and cry..._  
_ You got bad, bad luck_

Under the hurt an ember of anger sparked back to life because he was always leaving her in the dark. Like the time he'd kissed her and hired her back the next day without telling her why any of it happened. Like the time he kissed her and she later learned he was having sex with Cam. Like now, when he kissed her and promised they'd always be coffee, but he didn't care that she'd spent two weeks in hell over his fake death.

Fake rock.

Fake body.

Fake death.

Fake funeral.

Fake love.

Authentic emotional impulse.

The door slammed to the side at the sweep of her hand and the words hurled out, startling him thoroughly. "I need to talk to you!"

To say he was shocked might be an understatement. "What the hell, Bones! I'm in my house, in my bathroom, in my bathtub!"

_Bad, bad luck,_ the singer taunted. Wanting his full attention, she wrenched the needle off the record, probably scratching the vinyl and maybe that was his bad luck.

Booth sputtered, "How the hell did you get in here, anyway?"

He was alive.

Her eyes hung on the small square bandage covering the entrance wound. "Well that fake rock by your front door wouldn't fool anybody." She forced her glance away, answering his question and trying to comprehend what motive had him in this damn bath acting like nothing was wrong. "Why are you wearing a hat that dispenses beer?"

"Hot tub plus cold beer equals warm beer. Hat, equals solution." It was his house and his bath and he was annoyed to find out that her catching him using the contraption could make him feel a little embarrassed. Impatiently he deflected, "Why are you—?"

"And that cigar?" Did he have a death wish? Didn't he know that consuming alcohol in a heated environment accelerated the body's metabolism of alcohol, rapidly increasing the rate and intensity of intoxication and putting him at risk of falling in the slippery bath, or falling asleep, either of which could result in drowning? Didn't he know that smoking leads to lung cancer? Didn't he see that holding a cigar that close to a paper magazine risked fire? Didn't he know she cared about him? "Very unhealthy."

But all she'd succeeded in doing was annoy him. "Okay, what the hell do you want now, Bones? 'Cause I'm not really feeling too relaxed."

_He_ wasn't feeling relaxed? How relaxed did he think she'd been during the previous fourteen days of hell? She just wanted him to _acknowledge_ her suffering and he was here indulging himself in a bathtub. "You should have told me that you weren't dead."

Booth glared at her. "I already explained this to you. The Bureau has to vet everyone when there is a security issue. I was just following protocol."

"_Protocol!?_"

"Yes!"

Oh, she saw how it went with him. Protocol was the convenient excuse he used to get what he wanted and to avoid what he didn't want to deal with. Like the time he broke protocol to date Cam and Brennan was kidnapped by the Gravedigger. That very night Brennan had let him off that hook as soon as he'd blamed himself, but now she pulled it out and threw it at him, the reminder of how protocol was not something he always followed with such devotion.

"We've been partners for three years! You've broken protocol before, sometimes putting my _life_ in danger. Which makes sense because _you clearly don't have any real concern for me!_" This last came tumbling out in an emphatic rush because he was taking a damn bath! With beer and cigars and there was the proof that he didn't care.

All the subtext of that single sentence slammed into him, activating guilt. The lapse of broken protocol from a year ago, the lie of omission that she'd caught him concealing. Now furious himself at the implied accusation, he leaped up fast. He'd forgotten for the moment that he was naked. "I took a bullet for you!"

"Once! That only goes so far." Water sluiced off him in sparkling drops, catching her eye and she halted, drawing in a startled breath. He seemed to recognize his nudity at the same moment, freezing as he waited for her to give in to temptation. All those times he'd stopped her, stopped them, claiming it was better to wait, to anticipate, and she'd been so frustrated with his puritanical morality. There he stood, exposing his 'home base' and Brennan felt a smirk slide across her lips.

With consummate self-control, she held her eyes steady on his face but long overdue satisfaction twirled a victory dance around her question. "Would you like a towel?"

The balance shifted and corrected itself somewhat with his exposure. Slowly, he sank back into the water, feeling his ears smolder and his cheeks sizzle even though she had respected him enough not to look. "Fine." As if that one small word could restore his dignity and her trust. Brennan had relaxed a little because of his unscheduled peep show, but clearly she wasn't going anywhere until she was fully satisfied.

And so he sighed and then surrendered. "What is it that I should have done, Bones? What did you want me to do?"

It should go without saying by this time but she said it yet again. "Well you could have called me."

His eyes hardened, his arguments against breaking protocol gearing up for a repeat performance that she quickly cancelled with the question that might have mattered most. "Did you really think I needed to be vetted by your boss? Don't you trust me?"

"Of course I do!"

"Then _why_ wasn't I told?" Didn't he wonder? Why didn't he understand how important this was? Why didn't he _care?_ "It must have been something you said."

"No, I don't know why you weren't told!" Why was she harping on this? It was the FBI, a tentacle of the Federal Government, a freaking bureaucracy. What the hell did she expect? The Army had coined terms to describe this very phenomena when dealing with the Federal government: SNAFU. Situation Normal, All F-d Up. This was the same organization that had fired her and hired her back in a 24 hour span. This was the organization that had suspended him for shooting a mechanical clown on an ice cream truck, but not for dropping a man off his partner's balcony one week previously. While he dearly loved his job and the Bureau, it was no secret that local cops preferred to think the FBI stood for 'Fumble, Bumble & Incompetent.'

Really, did she honestly expect the FBI _not_ to screw it up...?

Brennan was nothing if not persistent. "But you said that I should be. I mean, aren't you curious why I wasn't?"

Finally, he heard it: You'd better be curious. You'd better pay attention to the question. You'd better find the answer. So, he finally got curious. "Yes. Do you want me to find out why you weren't told?"

Very calmly and almost nonchalant, she warned him. "If it's important to you."

It had better be important.

"Fine. I will." She relaxed at last, tension draining out of her body and he griped, "Next time I die, I promise I will tell you."

It was ridiculous, he realized, what he'd just promised. But she agreed to his offer as casually as if they've just agreed to lunch next week. "I'll look forward to that."

Acutely uncomfortable now at the thought of truly dying and thus not being able to tell her anything, he muttered, "Me, too." Pointedly he snapped the booklet in his hands back open and attempted to lose himself in the pages of a vintage _Green Lantern_. Now if only she would take the hint and let him finish his bath _privately_, as God intended.

"What are you reading?" she inquired conversationally.

What the hell? He flushed. "A novel." Off her silent contradiction (Brennan no doubt expected novels to be 500 pages without illustrations), he amended, "It's a graphic novel."

Her appreciative gaze slid unapologetically over his naked skin and her parting shot reminded him of the stakes. What had developed between them, what he'd denied her, what this confrontation had exposed. "Just so you know, I find your lack of Puritan modesty very refreshing."

She left just as quickly as she'd entered, dropping the needle back onto the record after the second chorus and sliding a barrier in between them once more.

_Some people go to church on Sundays,_  
_ others they pray at home._  
_ You tell them that there ain't no God,_  
_ that they're better off standin' alone._

He tried to settle back into the water, tried once again to forget how screwed up everything had become but Social Distortion knew the score and sang her out of his apartment.

_No one really knows the reason why._  
_ You get to the top and then you fall,_  
_ Gonna hang down your head and cry. _

~Q~

Sweets was there when the explosion happened, destroying Zack's hands and flooding Brennan with more terror, more grief, more pain than she could tolerate. It was all so loud in her head that even the bones had to scream to get her attention. She was deaf from overstimulation. But Sweets kept picking at her.

He followed them to the Diner, after making a jibe about Booth seducing her with pie. After Booth had dragged Sweets into her office and revealed Sweets's 'professional' decision not to tell her the message Booth had asked the Bureau to send. Sweets was the one who decided not to tell her Booth was alive.

Even here in a public restaurant Sweets pursued her. He sat down next to Booth with a stack of personnel files on her friends: Angela, Hodgins, Zack, even Cam. She grabbed the top one, outraged. "Whoa! You've been spying on us? More experiments?"

"What experiments?" Booth caught it, glancing back and forth and she knew he would pick up subtext.

But Sweets was brilliant at deflection. He pushed Hodgins's file towards her and began pointing fingers. All circumstantial evidence pointed towards an inside job and Hodgins had access. He was paranoid. He was suspicious. He worked with Zack.

And she refused to believe it. "It's all supposition, there's no concrete evidence."

She still couldn't read people very well, no matter how hard she tried. But it could not be Hodgins, her heart insisted and her mouth begged Booth to stop Sweets, to shut the psychologist up. Her head heard Booth urge Sweets to continue, knew Booth was correct to be objective and consider the evidence Sweets had.

But all he had was suspicion and circumstance. And what she _knew_ was that Zack couldn't work anymore and Sweets had deliberately broken her trust with Booth, and he had files on her friends and now another friend was in his sightlines. He was isolating her, she felt it. His eyes swarmed over her, watching and again she saw the little gleam of anticipation.

So she called him out, tried to get to the root of what he wanted with her. "I also had access to the chemical Zack made, why am I not a suspect?"

"You have a reverence for life that belies the cold calculations of a killer," he stated.

But that wasn't what he'd said about her on the witness stand during her father's trial. Then, Sweets had argued that she was more than capable of rationalizing murder. Brennan dropped her gaze, feeling acutely observed and uncomfortable as the contradiction disoriented her, and then she felt him probing her again. "And the emotional connection you share with Agent Booth is—"

"No, I— I don't have time for this," she stammered. "No!" God damn it! Damn him. What game was he playing? She bolted from the table, still heartsick over Zack's injury, still struggling to understand why Booth didn't understand her and now Sweets was accusing Hodgins and digging into her again.

_Why?_

Brennan slammed outside and nearly barreled into the street without even noticing the car bearing down on her, felt her arm caught and herself pulled back so fast she stumbled backwards against the curb and nearly fell. But he had her, Booth had her and caught her and she trembled with the strain.

"What's the matter, Bones?"

"I don't trust him," she snarled.

He glanced backwards and tugged her to the corner in time to make the crossing with the light. "Why not?"

She didn't know, didn't know how to read anyone. Didn't know how to trust anyone but Zack, Angela and Hodgins. Lachrymal fluid seeped over the edges, spilled before she could blink it away and Booth saw it. Sweets took Booth away from her, made it hard for her to trust. Now he was trying to take Hodgins.

Which meant she didn't have anyone but herself to trust. Drawing herself into a tight bundle, Brennan pulled away from her partner and left him trailing behind. The bones were calling, bones that never lied. She would find the truth on her own.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Two questions prompted this interpretation. 1) Why did Zack wait until that particular moment (when Booth was back from the dead and everyone was arguing) to give Brennan the mandible...? And 2) you will find out in the next chapter. (That's just Evil of me, I know) Meanwhile, carefully consider the Shakespeare quote from the beginning of this chapter, as it gives clues. Some people turn traitor for noble reasons, others just for personal gain.


	30. Revealing the Master

Author's Note: To all of my readers, thank you so much for keeping with this story. My current goal is to wrap this story up in 40 chapters total, so that means we're 3/4 finished if I stay on track.

The second question that prompted this interpretation of events was, if Zack believed in the Master's logic and that the apprentice is expendable, then when he was blindfolded for the trip to the master's house he should have obeyed the implied command that he wasn't supposed to know the master's name or address. Thus I ask, why did Zack memorize the route to the Master's house and look up the address on a map? Why would he go to so much trouble to defy the Master (who deliberately blindfolded him) if he truly believed in the rightness of what he was doing? Is it possible Zack had an agenda of his own...?

* * *

~Q~

~Revealing the Master~

~Q~

**"Let every eye negotiate for itself**  
**And trust no agent..."**

_Much Ado About Nothing Act II, Scene 1, Lines 178-179_

~Q~

"Why don't you trust him?" Booth Regarded his partner curiously as she walked stiffly back to the Jeffersonian, almost as if he weren't there. He searched his memory of her, trying to think of any other time he'd seen her this agitated, and only one incident came to mind. She'd acted erratic and unsteady like this the day she learned her mother had lived two years after vanishing.

Brennan kept walking, but she was not ignoring him. He'd asked for a reason and all that served to do was to remind her that she didn't have evidence. That was the problem Brennan now confronted, the recognition that she only had intestines that churned, the _feeling_ that she was under siege. She'd had this feeling before, many times. In _that_ house, where beatings were capricious and yet it was the 'creative' punishments that terrified her into compliance. In El Salvador, where guns and threats broke up the darkness. The day she'd learned her entire life was built upon her parents' lies. And now, with eyes that watched and suspicions that mounted but she had no _proof_. Nothing but this feeling.

Sweets would probably say she was projecting or deflecting or some other 'ecting' thing having to do with her childhood traumas.

Psychologists were par for the course in the life of a foster kid, which meant she'd had plenty of unpleasant encounters. They were always trying to get inside her mind, tease apart what she thought, how she functioned, why she survived, like she was a clock that could be taken apart to see the inner workings. Inane questions, expectations that just talking would ease the wounds she suffered at the hands of others, dismay when she refused to participate, followed inevitably by reports that she was avoiding, denying, or otherwise evading her emotions and thoroughly uncooperative. "I hate psychology," she muttered by way of an answer.

"Psychological profiling works, Bones." But he was putting it together now, her disquiet, her abrupt rejection of Sweets's suggestion. Her scathing question: _'More experiments?'_ There was more at play here than it seemed.

She finally turned at that, regarding him with a potent combination of disgust and dismay. "No it doesn't! Profiling is nothing but statistics and generalities that are fitted to a suspect after the fact. It serves no use whatsoever in helping investigators to actually identify a suspect, nor in obtaining a conviction."

"Hodgins works at the Jeffersonian and he has both the knowledge to design an explosion and access to the chemicals," Booth pointed out.

"So does Zack." She shook her head, seeing exactly what Booth failed to understand. Sweets had already closed his mind onto Hodgins, and now Booth didn't want to look anywhere else. Profiling closed the mind and an investigator needed to keep their mind open. "And so do I, Booth."

"Zack is the one in the hospital," Booth reminded her. The notion that Brennan was working with a serial killer was so preposterous that he didn't even bother to address it.

They halted on the sidewalk right next to a cart selling tourist junk with sunshine and families streaming past and she stepped very close, speaking with a calm that belied how angry she was at the implied accusation toward a member of her metaphorical family. "Hodgins would _never_ hurt Zack. It's not _him_."

"You're not being objective," he exclaimed, quite shocked. Brennan, of all people, who wouldn't believe she had a nose on her own face without seeking proof in a mirror, was rejecting an idea out of hand.

"Psychology is not a science! It's just an opinion," she countered. "He has no evidence, nothing. I refuse to waste my time on baseless supposition. That's your area." And she turned again, walking towards the National Archives where the United States Constitution was on display. To her left the fountains churned at the circular US Naval Memorial, so close that she considered going there to rest in the white noise and let ambient sound drown out the throbbing wails in her head. Too much was happening, too much.

Yet she didn't get any rest because Booth kept with her, argued with her all the way back across the street and into the lab and by the time they reached her office they were both spinning their windmills. Or wheels. Something was going rounds and Brennan sighed when Booth said yet again, "Look, he's just trying to help, Bones."

"Well, his opinions won't get you any convictions. He doesn't have any evidence." There's no evidence because it's not Hodgins, her irrational heart insisted. It's _not._ And if this was the way that Dr. Sweets was going to keep 'helping,' then she wanted no further assistance from him. Baseless speculation, human experimentation, unethical practices, manipulation, a betrayal of the Hippocratic Oath that staggered her. Her head ached with it all.

"Yeah, but he's a profiler with a great track record."

Mercifully, the spinning stopped there because behind Booth, Cam had halted at the door to Brennan's office and at the mention of 'profiler' she stuck her head in to ask, "Who?"

Booth answered succinctly. "Sweets."

Cam. Brennan stepped towards her, trusting her more than even Booth at the moment which well and truly indicated how unbalanced everything had become. "Sweets says that Hodgins is the killer."

Cam came in and shut the door, met Brennan's eyes boldly. "Well, that makes sense."

Disbelief. "What?!" No, not Hodgins. No, it did _not_ make sense.

And then Cam said the most peculiar thing. "Well, it would throw suspicion off _him_."

"Who," Booth demanded.

"Sweets."

Brennan's eyes opened wide, and the knot that had formed in her intestines loosened considerably. Because she didn't trust Sweets, and now she knew Cam didn't either. And, Cam _could_ read people.

Booth stepped towards Cam, clearly shocked. "You think that _Sweets_ is the killer?"

It turned out Cam had her very own string of suspicions, intricately knotted and based on circumstances and actions rather than circumstances and psychological blubber. As far as Brennan was concerned, actions merited much stronger consideration because they could be verified. "He shows up right after you find the Gormogon Vault, right when Gormogon's at his most vulnerable. And in therapy he plays you two like a cheap piano until you ask for his help with the case."

"Wait a second," Booth protested. "Nobody plays me like a cheap piano."

Brennan held silent, recalling all the reasons she hated psychology, and it was for precisely this: playing with people. Sweets had played them both, even if Booth didn't want to admit it. And Cam saw, her gut had vision, nearly the same acuity as Booth's.

Cam continued, "Hey, we all trusted the 'brilliant young profiler.' I got him security clearance because he was going to help us."

"He was here," Brennan said softly, meeting Cam's accusation with more trust than she would have thought possible a year ago. She didn't know if this was instinct or intestines, she couldn't read anyone, but Cam … she trusted Cam right now when she was defending Hodgins and giving a voice to Brennan's own feeling that she still couldn't articulate. "He had the opportunity to switch Zack's chemicals."

"Wait, except he's not a chemist," Booth insisted, flummoxed to find himself facing two scientists (one a former street cop) and yet he was the only defender of objective reasoning this day.

"He's the only one we can't account for after the explosion," Cam told him.

Covering the chills that ran through her, Brennan forced herself back into objectivity. As much as possible, she had to stay objective and she would not let this fear and paranoia turn her into something she loathed. "Well great, now we sound like Sweets. We have no evidence."

Fiercely, Cam defended her intuition. "I was a cop for ten years, Dr. Brennan. I can _smell_ it on him."

He's hiding something. He can't be trusted.

Brennan knew at least one thing he was hiding: his agenda to experiment on her and destroy her trust in Booth. And Cam could read people; she sensed it too, but there was no evidence. Nothing but fingers pointing in multiple directions and it sounded harsh and dismissive but she had to say it. Had to remind herself of how it worked here in the lab.

"I'm sorry, but we need more than your gut feeling."

"Well then _find it_. Because trust me, Sweets is your boy."

Brennan nodded, holding Cam's gaze just long enough to let her boss know that getting evidence was precisely what she intended to do.

~Q~

Booth watched Cam leave, watched his partner slowly seeming to curl inwards like a paper aflame. What the hell was going on? "I'll see you later," he told Brennan and took off after the woman who might have some answers.

They went into Cam's autopsy suite, and he just stood blankly in front of her, frankly confused. "Sweets?"

"He's up to something, Seeley. You know me, you know my instincts are never wrong."

Booth scowled darkly. "He is not a serial killer. That is _my_ gut talking. It's not him."

And Cam was angry, just like Brennan, and brought it up again. "You weren't here!"

"That's not my fault," he exclaimed again. What the hell was wrong with these people, holding it against him that he'd acted in the best interests of the United States?

"I'm not talking about that," she insisted. "You don't know what went on during those two weeks. You didn't see it."

"See what?"

"The obsession with Brennan."

He tightened his jaw, briefly considered just leaving before Cam told him something he didn't want to hear. He settled for redirection instead. "What does this have to do with Sweets?"

Fiercely, she whispered her suspicions. "You didn't see him, coming around every day, asking questions about her. 'How is Doctor Brennan doing? How is she coping? Where is she now?' Every day, he'd corner us one by one to ask about her. And that mandible was addressed to her. The patellas were sent to her _house_. He's obsessed with her, and even she senses it."

Even Brennan was suspicious, this he knew. Files on the staff. _'You've been spying on us? More experiments?'_ An obsession. Cam's suspicion. Her demand the he find out why. Sweets's decision not to tell her and the way the fired died in her right afterwards. _'I don't trust him!'_

_Brennan doesn't trust me either,_ he realized with horror. She thought she was alone in this.

~Q~

Sweets put up quite a protest when they went to question him a few hours later.

After reviewing the security tapes with Cam and confirming Dr Lance Sweets had disappeared after the explosion, Booth went to her office to snag Brennan and found her studying images on a monitor. "There's something wrong with the mandible," she mused.

"Come on, Bones." He tugged gently on her arm. "What's wrong with it?"

"The color. I think I saw it before but I didn't follow up." Because she'd been distracted by Booth and now Brennan shook her head in frustration. Emotional impulses led to distractions and missed opportunities. She should have checked into this much earlier, instead of rushing off to interrupt a bath. Cam had taken some tissue samples and run them for toxicology and DNA, however. Brennan decided she should inspect the results as soon as possible because something about the mandible was tugging and scratching at her. "I need to check with Cam."

"All right, you can do that later," Booth insisted. "Right now, I need my partner."

"For what?"

"To help me question a suspect."

He took her with him to find their quarry in the same Diner they'd left him in hours ago. Like a pair of wolves, they circled and surrounded their prey, Brennan covering his hindquarters and Booth blocking the exit. They sat flanking him, too close for comfort and as they'd questioned him, Sweets turned sarcastic and then combative, but never once did he meet Brennan's steady gaze. His sarcastic confession was followed immediately by recalcitrant refusal to submit peacefully to an arrest on the spot.

"Am I going to have to break out the cuffs," Booth demanded, which ended up being enough to get the kid out of the Diner without any further disruptions after all.

"You can't be serious! This is fierce wicked," the shrink complained for the third time. Brennan, finally returning to a state of calm and focus, had asked Booth to return her to the Jeffersonian to follow clues in the bone so they could have solid evidence. Booth still had young Dr. Sweets unhappily caged in the SUV. "You're projecting," he insisted, determined to psych his way out of custody.

"Yeah, you already said that," Booth snorted. The car came to a halt in the Hoover's garage and Booth turned towards his reluctant passenger. "And you are deflecting."

"I'm not deflecting anything." But Sweets paused, seemed to test the waters of Booth's patience. The kid wasn't stupid and had guessed this wasn't fully about him being some demented apprentice. "You don't actually think I'm working with Gormogon."

Booth studied him, the slow, assessing stare that brought about nervousness in people with something to hide. Sweets licked his lips, fidgeted, showed every classic sign of wishing he were somewhere else. Finally, stressed to breaking by the silent interrogation, he croaked, "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Because you're hiding something."

And he could see that it was true. Cam's instincts were seldom wrong.

"I'm not Gormogon!"

"I didn't say that's what you were hiding."

"But that's why you're arresting me," Sweets reminded him almost desperately.

Booth laughed, low and dark. "That was just a ruse to get you here where I want you."

Here, where Booth wanted him? Alone in a deserted parking lot, in the interior of a nearly soundproof SUV? Sweets gulped. Actually swallowed hard like a cartoon shrink about to be headshrunk and Booth watched with that steamrolling stare as he let the psychological pressure mount. Another minute passed before he cracked. "Doctor Brennan told you."

"Experiments, Sweets. Out with it now, or you're going to wish I'd just arrest you. I have more than enough probable cause."

"What probable cause?" Sweets sounded thoroughly shaken to realize he hadn't been arrested already only because Booth intended to threaten him with something worse.

"Tell me what you did to my partner," Booth bellowed.

"She didn't tell you?"

Booth wrapped a hand into Sweets's jacket, jerking the younger man closer. "She's my partner. She doesn't have to tell me, I can tell there's something wrong even if she never says a word."

"I didn't tell her your death was faked," Sweets began faintly, going only so far as to report what had been said, not what had actually been done. "She accused me of running an experiment."

"What kind of experiment?"

"She didn't specify," Sweets hedged truthfully.

But Booth remembered Cam's suspicions. _"You didn't see him, coming around every day, asking questions about her. 'How is Doctor Brennan doing? How is she coping? Where is she now?' Every day, he'd corner us one by one to ask about her."_ The sickening realization made him shove Sweets back into his seat and exit the SUV before he actually smashed the kid's face in. Fury flowed through his muscles like lightening, making them twitch, heating his body and flaring bright white light inside his head.

He heard the car door open and close, sensed Sweets coming around to see him, and marveled at the level of stupidity that move betrayed. Booth stepped forward, driving Sweets back against the car with a hand at his scrawny neck. "You wanted to see what she would do?"

He squeaked. "I was curious. She's always so controlled."

"She's not a lab rat," Booth hissed. "She's a human being and she has feelings. You broke my partner, you broke her trust in me. Do you have any idea of the harm you've done? I should just _kill_ you."

"She was afraid this would happen," Sweets spluttered, totally terrified by the menacing mountain of angry Booth threatening to bury him. Seeing Booth's expectant glare, he gulped harshly under the hand just barely loose enough to let him do it. "After she accused me, she said if you found out you'd ... you'd beat me up."

After everything, she'd still protected the idiot kid from discovery and the beating he so richly deserved. Booth shook his head and barely resisted the urge to squeeze the breath out of him. Barely. It was only because she clearly didn't want that. Yet his fists ached to hit something. His whole body vibrated with the urge to rip something apart, to destroy. Something needed to be wrecked. Damn it! A string of curses flowed venomously through his head but his hand let go. The kid sagged gratefully against the car. Using his key fob to lock the doors of the car, Booth turned and strode violently away, every footfall like an avalanche.

"Where are you going?" Sweets asked nervously, once again stupidly trying to keep up.

"To the gym." There was a heavy bag with the damn kid's face on it.

"You know, I can help you with those anger management issues," Sweets suggested.

Booth turned, returned, loomed over his prey. "The only reason you're not bleeding is because she protected you. This is not over. When I come to collect payment, you _will_ pay the price. You understand?"

"Yes," he whispered.

"Stay the hell away from her," Booth warned. "You try anything with my partner, I will shoot you. I won't hesitate. Got it?"

"Yes." Sweets almost slipped and added 'sir,' but Agent Booth was walking away again and he finally recognized it was in his own best interest to let the enraged agent leave.

~Q~

As she'd hoped, it was Cam's tissue samples that explained the discoloration. Brennan and Cam realized simultaneously that the mandible had been subjected to ultraviolet light decontamination, a Jeffersonian standard procedure before bones went into storage.

Angela helped Brennan summon her graduate students and assembled them in Modular Skeletal Storage. Distracted by the whispering bones, Brennan knew she was abrupt and harsh with them but she didn't care. They spent their opportunity scrambling for attention, which was completely inappropriate given the circumstances. Her patience was already thin, her fear magnified by this implication because Hodgins did not come down here; and Sweets wouldn't have known to put bones through the ultraviolet light first. And Zack... Zack was in the hospital with third degree burns.

It began to go awry when her students slowly gathered parts of a skeleton belonging to a middle aged man, minus his mandible. Brennan stared at him, oddly reluctant to let her fingers walk the treacherous bonescape. When she touched his femur he again whispered the fears she'd rejected as lies and pleas that she ignored because he'd been a liar in life. But bones never lied, only living people did. She instructed one of her students, "Have Doctor Saroyan take DNA samples and compare them to all of Gormogon's known victims."

Because no one would believe she already knew who he was, and what he'd told her.

"You suspect something, don't you?" US Prosecuting Attorney Caroline Julian accused.

She shook her head, refusing to speculate, refusing to worry or entertain the sick dread coiling in her belly. "I ... I have no facts yet. My opinions are not relevant." She wouldn't be like Sweets, pointing fingers without evidence. It could be a coincidence. It could be, couldn't it? And maybe the bones of liars could lie after death.

But it all fell apart when another of her students pointed out the fact that they'd collectively found a set of 20 altered skulls and mandibles in Modular Skeletal Storage, all of them missing their canine teeth. Canines... Twenty faces flickered and scowled, their outrage palpable. Brennan felt almost dizzy with their disapproval, realizing who was responsible. _She_ was; anthropology was her department in the lab, her job to keep these lost people safe. She stared into twenty true faces and felt the truth closing in like a looming sandstorm sweeping in.

"I need to examine the mandible Zack was working on during the explosion." Brennan ran from Limbo, sensing the roar of scouring truth scratching at her heels.

The mandible of Gorgomon's lobbyist had been marked by canines, but Brennan had trusted Zack's assessment that the scoring was embedded with polymethylmethacrylate. She'd not been hasty to follow up (though she would have eventually) because it was Zack and she'd believed him over the bones of a liar. But the bone had whispered truly all along, and because of her emotional attachment to her former student, she'd not been objective. She'd refused to listen.

The entanglements with Booth had blinded her to justice and what the dead needed her to hear. "I'm sorry," she whispered to the vindicated jawbone, and for some reason a Bible passage floated into her mind. "With the jawbone of a donkey, I have slain a thousand men." Was it true? Had her selfish indulgence in emotional attachments caused Zack to go astray? Had this man died because she wasn't paying attention?

And that was the blow that struck deepest into her heart. It was _Zack_….

He'd lied. He'd stolen canine teeth and made a set of dentures made of real human teeth, not molded plastic. The teeth Zack had made were the same teeth that had scored the mandible she held in her hands. Not plastic teeth, real ones that he'd stolen from real people with faces that grimaced at the postmortem injustice they'd suffered under her care.

By now operating on the cusp of exhaustion, she researched it herself, the reason for canines. The reason he would do it. Wolves symbolized freedom, a benevolent agent that delivered one from persecution. Booth found her staring at the truth with a pain growing in her chest, spreading outwards to consume her and overtake the painful howling that keened inside her head. Still stunned, she tried to explain it to Booth, what Zack had done.

And she realized he'd already explained the reason why, what he'd said to her about rational decisions. _There are greater considerations than just one individual person. The opportunity to flush out a dangerous criminal could not be passed up or risked for the happiness of one person..._

Zack would have known she would discover him.

And he'd done it anyway.

~Q~

The moment he saw her, he knew. "You looked at the mandible," Zack said softly, seeing the broken beauty in her. The greater good, he reminded himself. It was all for the greater good.

"You had to know I'd see it eventually."

Yes, he had known this would happen. He'd known from the moment he gave her the box, that it would end this way. And it was an acceptable end, because his Master was restored and she was working with Booth again, and the rest of their family would survive the betrayals of the FBI.

When Booth demanded a name, Zack admitted that he didn't know it, and why he'd enacted his plan. "The apprentice is expendable. _I'm_ expendable."

And she heard what he was really telling her. She intervened when Booth asked the right question at the wrong time.

"Zack responds to logic, Booth." She came closer to him to ask again, knowing the message was in his logic.

"The Master's logic is irrefutable," Zack told her. She would understand, he knew she would. Booth's anger got in the way when he demanded to know how killing and eating people could further justice, but Zack held himself steady, preparing to show her the truth. He told Booth, "If you knew what I know, you would understand."

Then Zack held her gaze, beheld the broken beauty that made him sacrifice everything. "You'd be proud of me."

"I've always been proud of you, Zack. I've never met anyone more rational or intelligent. But there's a fault in your logic."

No, there was no flaw. Zack felt a sick twist of fear that she would not understand and pushed the possibility away. "With all due respect, you aren't cognizant of his logic."

But she was. Brennan stopped at Zack's side and repeated the logic of the master as flawlessly as if she'd learned it at his feet.

"Assumption number one: secret societies exist."

"Accepted," Zack confirmed. "Hodgins has been explaining this to me for years."

"Assumption number two: the human condition is adversely affected by secret societies."

"Accepted."

"Assumption number three: attacking and killing members of secret societies will have an ameliorating effect on the human experience."

"Accepted," he said faintly. That was the master's logic, the logical conclusion Zack had accepted in order to accomplish his goal. Though he did not like to do it, the end justified the means and it was all for the greater good.

Dr. Brennan leaned over him, urgent, pleading, because she remembered the message he'd given her over the liar's mandible. "All of your assumptions are built upon a first premise, Zack. To wit: the historical human experience as a whole, is more important than a single person's life."

"Yes," he whispered. Did she understand? What she did with Booth was more important than his continued career or any escape from detection. What she did for humanity was more important than he could ever be.

More important than the master's work.

More important than anything.

"Yet, you risked it _all_, so you wouldn't hurt Hodgins."

Their eyes held, the understanding flickering between them. Brennan closed her eyes, rested her aching head against his and his tears flowed. He'd taken a risk of dying before he could complete the plan in order to save Hodgins, yes. But he'd already sacrificed everything, including himself, for _her_. Did she know it?

"There's … You're correct. There's an inconsistency in my reasoning."

Just like there had been in Booth's reasoning. Just like he'd told her, so she would understand when she found him. And this was how he finally knew she understood: when Booth reminded her that they needed a name, the master's name, Brennan spoke for Zack.

"We know," she said sadly.

She knew.

And Zack sacrificed it all for her, for the work she did. He gave her the false master, which had been the plan all along. That's why he went to the trouble of memorizing the route to her enemy's house and looking up the address later. That's why he helped ensure the damning silver skeleton, with all of its links to various murders, would be waiting in the master's house when Booth and his FBI agents showed up. The murders would stop. Her work would continue.

It was all for the greatest good.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: I suspect this will be a bit controversial because in the Show Zack admitted he intended to escape the hospital (although I can't imagine the master having any further use for him after Zack was so severely disabled and disgraced). Feel free to point out my rose-colored glasses. ;)


	31. The Fracture in the Family

Author's Note: Remember how I explained in chapter 21 (The Past in the Prologue) that I was veering into a "slightly AU" romance and that, in time, I would show you why I think it's only slightly AU. Well, here is the next clue that will explain why I'm telling the story this way.

As I was watching the first-run episodes of season four of Bones, long before the epic 100th episode turned everything we thought we knew on its head, there was the Man in the Outhouse and what Booth told Brennan in Sweets's office at the end. "There's someone you're meant to spend the rest of your life with. You just have to be open enough to see it."

At the time that first aired, I believed Booth was in love with Brennan but he knew she wasn't ready because of everything that had just happened. After rewatching for these chapters I've realized there was one more huge blow to her emerging trust in relationships, one that probably was completely overlooked by us fans. Booth was responding to that final blow by reassuring her he wasn't going anywhere.

Season four suddenly makes a lot more sense in the context that unfolds below. :)

* * *

~Q~

~The Fracture in the Family~

~Q~

**'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,**  
** Nor customary suits of solemn black,**  
** Nor windy suspiration of forc'd breath,**  
** No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,**  
** Nor the dejected havior of the visage,**  
** Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief,**  
** That can denote me truly. These indeed seem,**  
** For they are actions that a man might play;**  
** But I have that within which passes show,**  
** These but the trappings and the suits of woe.**

_Hamlet, Act I, Scene 2, Lines 72–86_

~Q~

Zack was in custody, which translated to isolation at the hospital. The moment Booth read him his rights, a glass wall separated him from those who would have prevented his downfall, if only any of them had guessed his intentions. After securing his detailed confession the friendly US Prosecutor Caroline Julian had arranged to have him transferred to a psychiatric hospital, despite the initial protest of Dr. Sweets (which Booth somehow quelled using only a heavy hand and a fierce whisper). Brennan observed all of this from a telescoped distance, through a cloud of noise and confusion. When Booth finally drove her back to the Jeffersonian and they all sat around in the loft, musing over their mutual lack of vision, she held silent and looked inward.

There were so many things she'd failed to see, but mostly she couldn't forgive herself for not listening to the bones. They might have warned her, they might have alerted her early enough to intervene. As her friends removed objects from Zack's box of personal effects, gifts they'd given him, the true cost of her failure finally emerged. She hadn't even done that right, even at the cost of sacrificing the dead and her apprentice. Maybe this was why he'd turned. "I never gave him anything."

She hadn't known she was supposed to.

Fighting back tears—she would not cry in front of others—Brennan fled her failure and her loss, and sank onto a lonely stair to wonder why she'd even tried. Wasn't she happier back then, with the ancient dead who only sometimes whispered but mostly kept to their dead and dusty selves. Wasn't she happier when Zack was only a student she barely knew, learning how to read the bones, and Angela was only a friend she barely tolerated, prattling about her dating adventures while Brennan only pretended to care? Wasn't she happier when Jack Hodgins growled and avoided her? Wasn't she happier alone?

Pressing her face into her palms, feeling the storm about to break, instead her body stiffened and iced over at the sound of footsteps. Her tears froze under her eyes, too hard to fall and the pain of suppression compressed her skull from all directions as if she'd been plunged miles below arctic seas. Icy cold, dark and heavy weights.

Booth sat down beside her, pulling out a single sheet of paper from an envelope addressed to Mr. Zachariah Addy, before he became a doctor. He'd found the letter tucked among the items Zack most treasured. Reading from Jeffersonian letterhead, her partner's solemn voice extended her invitation to study forensic anthropology as an intern under Dr. Temperance Brennan. Though brief, the acceptance letter ended with the words, "I feel you will find a home here."

A home; a family. People. Living people who loved and hurt and disappointed, and who disappeared, and who eventually died.

Handing her the letter, Booth said softly, "I think you gave him something great, Bones."

No, not great: disorder, disgrace and disfigurement. That's what being here had given Zack. She landed her weary head on his shoulder, as the frozen tears melted again and oozed silently and somewhere below her she could still hear the groaning bones.

"Is she all right?"

It was Angela, poised at the top of the stairs and seeing only her friend slumped against Booth.

Brennan pulled herself upright, discreetly wiping away traces of her vulnerability. "I'm fine, Angela."

"Come on, Bones. Let's get you home."

She let Booth pull her to her feet and silently gathered her belongings for the night. The papery sound of bone followed her everywhere in the lab but retreated once she reached the garage and vanished entirely once Booth shut her into the SUV. Brennan rested her head against the seat, eyes closed, fielding Booth's concerned glances several times during the drive but choosing not to respond.

He walked her to her apartment door but when she tried to go in and close him out, he pushed forward. "You shouldn't be alone right now."

"On the contrary, alone is precisely what I need to be." Because she'd spent the entire drive thinking and had reached the inescapable conclusion that it all stemmed from a single mistake she'd made. Just one, and that was to trust flesh. Living people caused pain and she could not handle anything more. No more relationships, no more agony. Alone was safe.

"Not tonight," he insisted.

"If I am going to be alone, it's best I reacquaint myself with the feeling." Shutting herself off took more effort now, she realized. The old tricks were unfamiliar, half-rusted remnants from the past like tools left abandoned in the yard these past few years. Some were rusty and some were altogether lost in their own miniature graves.

While she was metaphorically searching the open spaces outside for a way to lock herself in alone, he pushed her into her apartment ahead of him and shut them in together. "You are not going to be alone. You have friends."

"What good does that do?" No, no more pain. No more friends who would distract her, make her lower her guard, then wound at the first opportunity. She was tangled in relationships like spider webs, sticky and knotted and Zack had gone dark while she was so distracted. So no more. Brennan found more emotional gaps and blocked them, filling in the chinks in the wall she had to restore.

The cool, detached question caught him off guard. She was keeping her back to him, keeping her distance, and he sensed her defenses being rebuilt right before his alarmed eyes.

"Friends help each other." Warily, he approached her. "Bones..."

"I'd like you to go, Booth." That was it, a cool, vague dismissal.

"You're blaming yourself," he realized.

She turned at that, hitting him with frosted eyes and her face set like cool marble. "It _is_ my fault, I should have-"

But he cut her off. "No, none of us saw that coming. Not Angela, not Cam. God, not even Hodgins who probably knows him best because he lives with the guy!"

"Zack lives in a separate building from the main house."

"Not the point, Bones! The point is, we didn't see it."

She crossed her arms, looked away and accepted responsibility for her part in Zack's self-destruction. "I should have paid attention. It was telling me."

Sweets was wrong with his psychology. Cam was wrong with her cop instincts. And Booth was wrong to listen to either of them. All of them with their guts, and the only thing that reached the truth was objective evidence. The bones had told her right from the beginning, the only things that ever spoke truly. "I didn't want to believe it because of a foolish emotional attachment that clouded my objectivity. If I'd been objective, maybe he'd still have his hands."

"Nobody can be that objective."

"_I_ can!"

Or at least she could, before she'd let Angela talk her into this course. Before she met Booth. Back then, she'd operated on the scientific method: Don't jump to conclusions, don't let emotions get in the way. Pose a hypothesis, test it. Observe. Record. Follow the evidence and uncover the truth. That was how it had to be. And she was happier then. "I can, but only when I follow the evidence. And I didn't, Booth. I tried it your way, tried 'feeling' things, and this is what results."

Despite the rapid reconstruction of the fortress her voice still broke. He could still see inside and that gave him hope he might stop her before she built the walls too high to scale. "Bones, you can't blame yourself. Zack is an adult and he ... he made his choice. All right?"

And there was Zack who might have been saved maybe, if she'd not left him alone so much in the lab. Maybe, if she'd not been so tangled up in Booth. "You were right. People who work in dangerous situations should not get emotionally involved."

There it was, finally. The first fracture. Booth felt dread sprouting like weeds in the moat opening up between them. "You don't mean that."

No reply had him crossing the span that separated them, suddenly recalling that they had been separated for two weeks and aside from that not-quite-an embrace at the lab just an hour ago, they hadn't touched each other. "I'm not going back," he asserted.

There was no undoing what had already been done. _'You'll fall in love with her.'_ They could not go back to what they were before. And she was so beautiful, infused with that fragile silver glow that had first captivated him in a court room long ago, he knew there was no hope of resisting the pull.

Pulling her against him, Booth's hands warmed her spine and she let her head rest against his shoulder because it was too hard to keep it steady. He was warm and firm and yet under the soft T-shirt she felt the padding of a bandage. He was fallible and fragile, too. As she was remembering gaping holes and gurgling breath stolen by blood, he was lifting her chin and pushing his warm lips over hers, stealing her breath.

He knew he needed to get inside, get all the way in before she locked him out. Get inside. Fast. Storm the keep.

His kiss turned relentless, battering her defenses to get past the barrier, to get inside and open her back up. And she let him in, her lips parting, her body melting against his and her eyes falling closed so that he no longer feared the ice in them. Boldly plundering every available surface of her, he slid hands and lips over her contours and murmured his victory into the vulnerable hollow below her jaw, right over her beating pulse. "This is more than coffee, Bones. This is _fate_."

So unfair, the way he could do this to her, the way he could touch her and flood her with torrid chemicals that dulled her intellect and made her body explode with sensation. Every touch burned and it would be so easy to let go. Heat like coffee flamed under her skin, loosening her muscles and setting her blood to a temperature that approached boiling.

Booth was turning up the heat, his hands roaming into places they'd never gone before, uncovering her bases so rapidly she knew this time he meant to get to the home plate at a headlong run. Walking her backwards, Brennan sensed he was guiding her closer to her bedroom and before she could even begin to wonder if this wasn't a terrible idea they were already there. They were already there, hurtling over the last line that led to home.

"She was going to kill you," he murmured against her bared skin (how did that happen?) and his hands were reaching down to clasp her hips, pulling her into him so hard she felt his desperation like a brand against her belly. "I can't lose you. I won't."

They were down on the bed, limbs tangled and his hands in her hair, pulling her head back so he could suck at the flesh of her throat, taste her warm heart. So close, too close, not close enough. She realized his frantic need, understood it without knowing how because her body was seeking his, curving into his, needing him for completion.

It was happening so fast, too fast, his body over hers, his heat coming too close, stealing her breath as the weight came down.

He wanted to connect them, two people becoming one and it would only hurt worse after that.

Her heart clenched painfully and her breathing accelerated as memories of losing him again/already flashed backwards and forwards until she didn't know what was past reality or imagined, terrifying future. She only felt him surrounding her in warmth and then blood welling up slickly and then the cold, terrifying noise of being left alone. And she couldn't breathe. There was no air, no escaping the loss of air when he pressed her down and covered her mouth with his and surrounded her with safety that could break like fragile glass.

"No!" This time she was the one who pushed him away and stopped the race home. She exploded into a panicked frenzy. "No, no, stop!"

"What's wrong?" But he let her go because the panic was undeniable. _Don't you know by now that you can't rush her?_ Idiot! in the free-fall of passion he'd forgotten his own wisdom. So he had to let her go and just hope the damage wasn't too extensive; he had to start hoping she would come back to him.

"I can't do it." Couldn't endure any of it, couldn't risk more. If he died after they'd joined, she would too. She would die if he died again. "No no no..."

She scrambled away, terrified of the risk and breathing too fast. Too panicked. Trembling from overwhelming tension, she suddenly understood her body was reaching its limit because she hadn't slept since the night before his funeral and she hadn't really eaten anything since the explosion in the lab. And all the days before. The room warbled like a lava lamp, spinning slowly and was it exhaustion that compressed her chest? Drawing breath had become a challenge that only panting could accomplish. Her fingers and lips tingled and that's how she came to understand she was hyperventilating.

"Bones!" He sounded worried.

"I can't," she gasped. Couldn't stop loving him and couldn't bear to love him more. She was trapped, she couldn't breathe.

Her mind thought she didn't have enough air, so it made her breathe too fast until she had overloaded her blood with oxygen. That was the irony of hyperventilation: the symptoms of suffocation were caused by too much oxygen. She was upsetting the carbon dioxide balance in her blood, reducing it until there wasn't enough to trigger the breathing reflex normally. The treatment was often rebreathing one's own air. Brennan clapped her hands to her nose and mouth, forcing herself to slow down.

Everything just needed to slow down.

Complete silence held the room in thrall while she breathed and he watched. Finally, she slowed. Her shoulders sagged and her hands fell and she still wasn't in complete control but she was closer to normal now except for the fact that she was nearly nude and so was he and their clothing had been flung somewhere across the room. How had it happened? How did he always manage to make her lose her mind?

Finally, he spoke. "Are you all right?"

"No!" It came out harsh and guttural, wrenched from some pool of fury still untouched. "No I'm not all right. How could you think that I'd be all right?" How could Sweets think it? She twisted away from his touch, her sluggish mind tripping over the stupid therapy sessions where she and Booth had worked in concert to conceal almost everything. Had they been too successful in hiding the depth of their connection, or not successful enough?

Confused and still feeling fingers of panic trail over her spine, Brennan looked up at the man she'd thought understood her. He didn't, and she didn't know who to blame for that. Now he just wanted to make it worse, make it more dangerous by making love when she knew the risk because she'd already lived it. Though she tried to hold it back, the horror of it came out in a sob. "How could you think that you could die and I'd be all right?"

"I didn't think that," he defended quickly. "I told them to tell you."

She flashed her moonstone eyes up to his. He'd never seen them that color, an incandescent silvery blue so bright that his own eyes blinked in reflex. Tempe's eyes, fully illuminated, begged him to explain why he'd betrayed her. "You said you would do anything for me, but you wouldn't make a single phone call to find out why I wasn't told. I had to insist."

"I nearly gave my life for you! Isn't that enough?"

Her snarled words scraped deeply into him. "I never asked you to!"

It sounded like ingratitude, but he sensed, finally, what she wasn't saying. And he was so frustrated now, his body screaming with thwarted passion and her incomprehensible retreat at the last second. And the patience he wasn't quite sure he could master didn't come easily. "Is that what this is about? You're mad at me?"

Suddenly he remembered that he'd been hurt, too. He'd nearly _died_, and the moment she saw him again all Brennan had done was nearly break his jaw. And she'd been angry and distant ever since, never once expressing anything resembling gratitude or even relief that he wasn't actually dead. In fact, what she'd said had been cutting and cruel. "Is that why you didn't give a damn about even going to my funeral? Because you looked fine to me, Bones. You weren't crying. You even told me you compartmentalized and moved on."

And that hurt, damn it! It hurt him, too. His shoulder throbbed, he was throbbing in all sorts of uncomfortable ways while this mess exploded in their faces.

"Compartmentalize?" Brennan exploded into an entirely different kind of frenzy at that. "What does that even mean?! What. That my feelings are nothing but … socks I can stuff in a drawer? You think, because I usually don't let my emotions show around people I don't trust, that I don't _feel _anything? Is that what you think?"

Sweets had been pushing and poking when the trial started. She remembered him guessing that the colder she looked on the outside, the more she was feeling deep within. And it had all been a test. A sick, twisted test.

"You're the one who said it," he spat.

That's what most people thought. Only her closest friends knew the truth and until this moment she'd counted Booth among them. Booth had seen her laugh, had faced her wrath, had held her while she cried. They just about made love only moments ago, yet he didn't understand anything. Did he think she didn't love him because she didn't cry in public?

He wanted proof, her logical mind suddenly grasped, and if it was proof he needed, she would give it to him. Venomously, she asked, "You want to know what it was like when nobody was around, Booth? You want to know what your death did to me?"

He did, and yet something about the wicked light glaring out of her eyes made him shiver. If she'd had to suffer, then he was going to also.

"I cried for hours the night you died. My face was covered in snot and tears. I sobbed so hard that I couldn't breathe." She revealed each vicious detail as a snarling invective.

And he winced.

But she wasn't finished. "I couldn't eat. The sight of food, the smell of it, made me sick. Putting it in my mouth made me choke and even when I finally managed to swallow something it just made me vomit. I couldn't sleep. The dreams were horrible, blood and you and…" She broke off, shuddering. "I couldn't sleep so I stopped trying to. I worked constantly. I was so tired. I couldn't think. Everything looked grey and foggy. I couldn't hear anything but _noise_."

Brennan bit her lip, brought her hands up to cradle her own body because she really wanted Booth to do it yet she was sure she could not handle his touch without losing control again. She left him, walking across the room to retrieve a dressing robe and belt it around herself, covering the exposed vulnerability. Love and fear had mixed in her, two potent agonists fighting each other; the outcome was uncertain.

So she should tell him the rest. The need for full disclosure was what finally forced it out. She knew she was going to hurt him, but he at least deserved to know why. "Then the bones started speaking."

That baffled him. "The bones … spoke?"

"I heard actual voices. Usually it's only noise and … ideas. When I touch them, I get ideas. I wanted to touch your bones, but no one would let me. I wanted to hear you. The voices were so strong and so loud, I thought … maybe I could hear yours."

Booth shook his head in confusion, wondering suddenly if she'd been so exhausted that she'd hallucinated. By her own admission she hadn't slept or eaten properly in ten days. He looked at her closely, noting the smudges under her eyes and the way her collar bones stood out more sharply. The evidence was there, yet what she was telling him didn't make sense. The most rational person he'd ever met, had nearly gone insane over grief? For him?

"You don't believe in ghosts," he reminded her.

Their eyes met again, and he saw the illumination from earlier was fading. Tempe was vanishing. "I don't believe in a lot of things."

"What does that mean?" Because he knew she always spoke deliberately. She never said anything without intention, without purpose.

"It means I've been foolish to think that emotional attachments provide any kind of safety or assurance."

A cold dart of dread struck and spread. Booth knew what she meant now, knew she was in full retreat. The walls were thick, Tempe was concealed. "Don't…." Was it a command, or a plea? Would she heed either one?

"Zack, and you. I trusted you, and it _hurts_."

"Bones, please. I swear, I thought you knew."

"I can't trust anyone."

"You can trust me. Come on, you know that."

"You kissed me. You said you loved me, and then you stepped into a bullet for me. I thought you wouldn't have done that if we didn't get personally involved. I blamed myself for your death."

He shook his head in denial, because she was dead wrong about that. "I've risked my life for you before. You know that, damn it!"

The light was fading from her eyes. She was turning cold, hard, icy. "But I was wrong. It was duty. Your job is to protect civilians and your loyalty is to the FBI. Even when you knew no one told me, you didn't care."

"No, I do care. I've always cared."

"Then why did you stay away all day? Why did you take a bath instead of talking to me?"

Ashamed, he glanced away.

So she answered for him. "Because we work together, and there's a line that we don't cross."

"You want to go back to partners only." That was a heavy consequence for his one day trip through denial and self-pity (after being shot and nearly killed, remember?), but he wouldn't let it break them. He would stay beside her even when she began to run. "We can do that."

"I would appreciate that," she responded formally.

"I'm only stepping back because I love you. I'm not going to stop, I don't care how many lines you draw."

Reason swatted him back; cold, hard logic. Dr. Temperance Brennan glared at him, throwing out her challenge. "Fine. Prove that you love me, Booth."

"You need proof?"

She didn't answer, and the sense of impending dread grew. He knew she was preparing to put him through some kind of test and the only hope he had of getting her back was to withstand whatever she threw at him. _She needs someone who will never leave._

He stepped close, holding her frosted eyes with his while he accepted her challenge. "I'll give you time and I'll give you space, but I'm not going anywhere no matter what you do to push me away. That's the proof. You take as long as you need, you do what you have to do. I'll still be here when you're ready because _this_ ... what's between us ... is fate."

"I don't believe in fate."

"But I do."

And he would have to have faith enough for both of them until she found hers again.

~Q~

The wobbling began in London, where she was invited to speak as a guest at Oxford. Booth had his own invitation to make a presentation to Scotland Yard and their trips coincided, which was not a coincidence. (He wasn't letting her out of his sight.) Her anthropological host, Ian Wexler, began sniffing around Brennan immediately and she dangled his interest in her in front of Booth with well-practiced oblivion. "He's very interested in having sex with me."

Oh yeah, every male with a beating heart was interested in her while she still glowed with Tempe's pain. He managed to knock back lesser contenders with heavy scowls and Brennan's general myopia, but Wexler had the accent, the charm and a few PhDs, not to mention what Brennan claimed was his finest selling point: plentiful practice that ensured he was an expert in both biological and sexual anthropology. In other words, Wexler had probably bedded more women in the last month than Booth had managed in the last ten years.

(And Booth would have you know he did all right with the ladies, thank you very much.)

She heeded his urgent pleas to not waste herself on a womanizer (because, she conceded, it would be illogical to disrupt their partnership for a sexual relationship that could only last a few days at best). With that bit of partnerly trust restored, Booth hoped they might recover from the blows that had knocked their own relationship askew, but there was another blow coming. This one would have the most far-reaching consequences yet.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Two words: Final Exams. I may be a crazy person until next week...


	32. The Star to Her Wandering Bark

Author's Note: After reading the last chapter, consider again the Man in the Outhouse, the way Brennan kept spurning monogamy and suddenly dated two men at once. If she's testing Booth, looking for proof, he knows he has to stand firm and never waver. This interpretation explains both Booth's amused patience and Brennan's somewhat erratic behavior throughout season four, which really is pretty hard to explain otherwise.

The beauty of analyzing a text is that there can be many different interpretations. :)

On a personal note, final exams are over! Summer freedom means more time to think, to write, and to _read_!

A note on the quote: A 'bark' in Shakespeare's day was a small sailing ship.

* * *

~Q~

~The Star to Her Wandering Bark~

~Q~

**Let me not to the marriage of true minds**  
**Admit impediments. Love is not love**  
**Which alters when it alteration finds,**  
**Or bends with the remover to remove.**  
**O no, it is an ever-fixèd mark**  
**That looks on tempests and is never shaken;**  
**It is the star to every wand'ring bark,**  
**Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.**

_Sonnet 116, lines 1–8_

~Q~

Booth never had bothered to knock on the door and today he had even less of a reason to care about the lack of etiquette his barging in betrayed. As far as he was concerned, deliberately letting another human being suffer just to satisfy one's curiosity went far beyond what is merely rude behavior, so the kid was only getting what he deserved. Contempt.

"Time to pay the Piper," Booth announced coolly.

"Agent Booth..." Sweets froze where he was, hunched over a stack of personnel reviews, and tried not to let the older man see how nervous he felt as he sensed his comeuppance coming after him at last. What price was the agent going to extract from him? How much pain was going to be involved?

"Two things," Booth barked. "First, we're resuming partners therapy, only you're going to pretend it's for that book you're supposed to be writing on us."

That ... wasn't so bad. Breathing a sigh of relief, Sweets felt his posture loosen and he nodded agreement quickly, before Agent Booth changed his mind. He really wanted to write that book, now more than ever after all that had happened. "Thank you."

"Don't thank me. This is not for you, it's for _her_."

Curiously, Sweets reminded, "You told me to stay away from her."

Booth straightened, turned and paced to the window for a moment as he studied the streets and sightlines outside, practicing his skills while he sifted through the facts Sweets might need to know. It had taken Booth himself far too long to see how much losing him had rattled her. Partly that was because his own near-death and recovery had shaken him just as much. Then Sweets and his damn 'experiment.' After that came Zack. In London she'd witnessed another partnership (the womanizing anthropologist Ian Wexler and the amused yet tolerant Inspector Pritchard) torn apart by death.

And then, Brennan had fielded a broken phone call from her best friend, and ultimately _that_ had been the proverbial last straw. Brick. Boulder. The last blow from the avalanche of misfortune and destruction that had rained down on them all. "Angela and Hodgins broke up."

"Yes, I am aware."

He faced the kid, still uneasy about exposing more of Brennan to someone so untrustworthy, but the damage had accumulated too fast for him to reverse on his own. "Angela, Hodgins and Cam are feuding. Zack ... did what he did. Me dying. She's lost too many stable relationships already and now this is just... I think maybe she saw hope in them two being together but they didn't last. She's just giving up."

They were back to year one, with Bones muttering about chemicals and pheromones; love is ephemeral, monogamy a fantasy leftover from the days of male hegemony. (And he'd thought she'd been talking about hedges, but that didn't make sense so he looked the damn four dollar word up. She'd meant male dominance, a feminist rant. Great.) And while getting Sweets mucked up in his tortured, tangled relationship with Brennan ranked right up there with root canals in terms of things he'd like to do, his partner was wobbling too frenetically to see all the people still standing quietly beside her.

"So, you need my help."

"Only because you broke her faith in me." Glaring down at the kid, he decided he hadn't been clear enough about expectations. "I'll be doing most of the work undoing the damage _you_ caused, but I may need some back up here and there with all the other crap she's gone through lately. That's all you're going to be, is back up. Not front and center. Got it?"

"Yes."

"Good. Second thing. You're going to treat Zack."

"What?! No, he's..."

Booth gave him the just-try-and-defy-me stare and it worked. Sweets subsided with a gulp but tried again more sedately. "His pathology is beyond me, Agent Booth. I'm not qualified to treat the clinically insane."

"You said he wasn't."

"What?"

"What do you mean, what. You're the one who said it."

Sweets shook his head, growing confused. "I said he wasn't _what_."

Booth growled his irritated reply. "Insane, Sweets. You said he wasn't insane."

"When did I say that?"

"At the hospital."

"Oh..."

"Yeah, '_oh_.' I didn't join the FBI yesterday. So, since it was your professional opinion then that he's not insane, that means you're qualified. And you're going to do it."

"Why?"

Because Brennan had talked about logical decisions and utilities or something. Because she felt responsible for Zack and something she'd mumbled made Booth wonder if the kid actually might be innocent as well as completely sane and looking for the most painless way to reduce the consequences of an insanely rational act. Was it possible he really didn't belong in prison at all? Would Sweets be brilliant enough to uncover the truth? For Brennan's sake, if Zack hadn't actually killed anyone, it was worth a try. Out loud, he answered brusquely, "Because I said so."

Cautiously, the kid asked, "What if I refuse?"

"Then I lodge an official complaint regarding your lack of professionalism towards your own patient. You lose your job and your license to practice."

"Oh..."

"We're done here. I'll let you know when I need you." And Booth was gone, without a single sound to betray he'd ever been in the room.

~Q~

_"Hodgins and I broke up, and I won't understand why until I talk to you."_

Brennan replayed that message on her answering service ten more times, standing alone in her apartment only a few feet away from where she and Booth had enacted their own version of a break up. "I won't understand why," Angela's voice repeated, "until I talk to you."

They had spoken shortly after Brennan first heard the message, the entire story of an ex cavorting with a boss, of Angela's anger at Cam's indiscretion and of Hodgins, mired in mistrust over why she would care in the first place. "What does it mean," Angela asked tearfully.

And Brennan admitted that she didn't know, but given what Angela had described she could posit a hypothesis. "He looked for evidence in the form of your actions and behavior and drew a logical conclusion that you still have feelings for Grayson."

"He drew a wrong conclusion," Angela insisted. "He didn't trust me. How can we have a relationship if we don't trust each other?"

Now things were strained and awkward at work. Brennan felt the frostbite every time Hodgins refused to look at her, or snapped at Cam. She shivered every time Cam and Angela brushed silently past each other. Some days Brennan stood in the empty Ookie Room and missed Zack with an intensity that almost approached what she'd felt a year ago when he'd gone to Iraq. He was closer now in terms of literal distance and yet so much farther away behind plexiglass walls.

"I still don't know if we did the right thing though," Angela continued. "I miss him so much."

Forcing herself to pay closer attention, Brennan reminded herself that nothing lasts forever, but sometimes part of a relationship could still be salvaged. "You both did the rational thing, ending your physical relationship before any permanent damage was done. You can still be friends."

A short, cynical laugh. "You can't be friends after you've had sex."

What if you only came close but never actually did...? "Booth is friends with Cam," Brennan pointed out hesitantly.

"Okay," Angela conceded. "Maybe after like, ten years."

"I doubt you'll have to wait that long," Brennan soothed.

"I thought he was the one," Angela sniffled, finally past the outright tears but still stuck with the splintered voice and nasal discharge acquired after days of lachrymose mourning. "Like fate," she added. "I thought he was different and we'd be together forever."

Except they weren't together now, and Angela couldn't imagine a fate that didn't include Jack. She'd never felt this way before, where looking at him hurt but being away from him hurt just as much. What did it mean?

Brennan sighed. "Clearly fate, if it even exists, has other ideas."

"It does exist," the artist asserted, realizing she still loved him. That was why it hurt.

"It's highly improbable."

She didn't want to argue semantics. Angela pushed off the sofa where both were seated, pacing her own small apartment that she had barely spent any time in over the last year and yet she'd continued to pay the rent on it. "I love Jack, but it's not going to work between us."

Brennan pondered that for a moment, feeling as if a wall she hadn't known existed had suddenly been pulled away from her. What Angela was saying was yet another box ripped open to reveal no hope inside, only devastating proof. "You don't think love can last?"

"No. It's beautiful, but it doesn't last. And when it ends badly, there is where bitterness begins."

"So it's better to end it amicably," Brennan confirmed. Because the thought of not having Booth in her life was too painful to entertain.

Brennan replayed the message again, hearing Angela's teary plea. _"I won't understand why until I talk to you."_ Talking to Angela had not cleared up anything for her, although it had at least helped her friend. Brennan brushed a tear away and finally pressed 'delete.'

The next message was from Mark Gaffney, announcing he'd be in town tomorrow night and was she available...?

~Q~

It was a little disconcerting, how quickly Booth caught her. The very next morning began at the bottom of the sixth hour with Brennan throwing on a dressing gown (the same one) to once again deal with her complicated partnership in a state of half-dressed disorder. Booth had brought her coffee and an invitation to a crime scene personally rather than via a phone call. Arriving in person with coffee was how they'd operated since the trial, but she thought she'd made it clear they were no longer coffee.

Mark wandered into her kitchen straight from the shower, clad in only a towel and surprise to see another man in her apartment.

And Booth, his eyes wide, speared her with amusement. He was laughing.

Brennan scowled. Why was he laughing? Mark was physically attractive and possessed of a rather impressive sexual repertoire. Though he refused to leave without her, Booth didn't say anything else about what he'd discovered that morning. The disapproval she'd braced herself for with Mark didn't actually surface until she let slip the fact that she had date with Jason DeFry that evening.

Then, at last, she got a rise out of her partner. "Two guys at once, that's why they invented dueling," Booth warned with an odd concoction of amusement and concern.

"I know what I'm doing," she countered and tried to flee into an elevator because Doctor Sweets had just appeared and was now tuned into their argument with avid interest.

Booth rushed forward, slamming his hand against the door to halt her escape and prolong her exposure to the psychologist's keen scrutiny. Was he doing that on purpose? "I think you're going with your _gut_ on this one, and we all know how that turns out!"

And his eyes speared her again, no longer amused but _knowing_ because he well knew what kind of men Brennan had attempted to trust in the past. David Simmons, who ended up a cult recruiter. Sully, who left. Will Hastings, who murdered his brother. Zack. And Booth himself. Doubt encircled her throat like a noose but she slapped his hand away defiantly and held his glare with feigned bravado until the doors thumped between them.

Alone in the elevator, she fell against the wall and brushed another tear away. She would not let Booth make her question her own judgement again. She'd been careful this time.

Jason was bland. A botanist. Intelligent and yet of a slight enough constitution that she could kick his ass with one hand tied behind her back. (Brennan paused, trying to understand why that metaphor didn't quite make sense. One used feet to kick, not hands.) Finally she shrugged it off as a distraction and resumed her mental diatribe against her partner because the _point_ was, as Booth was fond of saying, that Jason was no threat. And Mark, she'd known for several years but hadn't entertained him since before Sully. Brennan knew both men, knew they wouldn't hurt her. She'd already informed Jason that she was willing to see him socially but not interested in a romantic relationship, a condition he'd agreed upon because he was a civilized man.

Still, when Booth crashed her date at the Diner that night, she felt a tumult of hope and fury, resignation and resistance. When Booth challenged her platonic relationship with Jason, she felt cornered. "How is it that he's satisfied not having sex with you?" Booth's eyes pinned her down, bringing to mind the times she'd not been satisfied stopping and then the final time when she had.

And why did she have to suffer the presence of Sweets, who chose that loaded moment to blurt out, "You _are_ hot!"

Booth glared a warning and Brennan felt acutely examined and dissected and vowed to continue this, only much later on when she was _alone_ with Booth. That ended up being two nights later, because Booth came to the art gallery opening when she called and invited him.

"A gallery opening isn't my scene," Booth remarked, but he arrived and met her at the door. "No date?"

"Why did you crash my date last night?" she asked bluntly in lieu of a reply.

And why did he always stand so close, she grumbled silently when he did it again. Was he expecting his pheromones to intoxicate her? Booth held her chin and spoke to her in that way that he had, snaring her with something resembling gravity in which strength is inversely proportional to the square of the distance between two objects. The closer he got, the greater the strength of attraction and the harder she fell back towards him.

"You can date anyone you want, but I will meet them and check them out."

"What?" she sputtered, finding escape velocity at last as she pushed back and turned and felt anger churning. He had no right!

"Your safety is the only thing I care about, okay? A guy checks out, fine. Mark and Jason both passed the background check, so take your pick. Boy toy or scintillating companionship." He waggled his brows at her teasingly.

She flushed and kept her eyes down as humiliation surged over her. "Let's just go," she finally muttered

"I just got here," he complained, glancing around the exhibit area with mild interest.

"I don't feel like staying," she admitted. What she wanted to do was go home and give up this mad ploy for male companionship. Dating was so difficult and stilted, filled with awkward pauses and her own shy uncertainty about how to act. Talking to Jason had turned out easier because the pressure of sexual performance was lifted; talking to Mark hadn't been necessary because there isn't much room for conversation while in the midst of sexual congress.

Talking with Booth was always easy, even now with loaded history groaning between them.

Booth took her arm gallantly and led her towards the exit, shouldering open a path for her and reminding her that so often, everything was easier with him. Even what he proposed next.

"Sweets has been pestering us to meet with him about that book he wants to write. What do you say we get that visit over with for the week?"

"Now?!"

He shrugged. "Sure, it will only take half an hour at most. Then I'll take you home."

~Q~

"Hey," Sweets exclaimed brightly when they entered his office. Booth had phoned ahead to make sure he was still there, which left Sweets in a state of thrilled anticipation for the next twenty minutes until they arrived. "Come on in."

He observed them both as Brennan and Booth filed quickly in, Booth in a suit and Brennan wearing a black satin dress that made Sweets's eyes pop a little. "You look nice," he blurted out, unable to help himself. While he'd always thought she was attractive, awareness of her seemed to have taken such deep root in the last few weeks that every time he saw her, _beautiful, regal,_ his libido spoke and his sense of self-preservation was always two steps behind.

Booth lifted his piercing scowl directly at Sweets, another warning shot after that lapse from two days ago in which Sweets had unwisely observed, _"You **are** hot."_ She wasn't hot so much as a beacon, Booth mused with an odd mixture of pride and resignation. Men were coming after her in droves lately. All he _could_ do was watch when what he _wanted_ to do was rip their lustful eyes out. The cad, Wexler. The master of breath-holding, Mark (who had won access to her body but not her heart). The conversationalist, Jason. Even Sweets was mooning over her now.

Booth growled and tossed himself down next to her, his territory firmly established.

Realizing he'd blundered again, Sweets gulped and retreated. What had changed, he asked himself. How had an ordinary awareness of a woman's objective attractiveness morphed into this acutely subjective sense that she was the most beautiful woman he would ever see? Why did he want her when he knew now without a doubt that she belonged to Booth? Forbidden fruit, perhaps. Or, there was some nuance about her that he had become aware of but just couldn't quite define. And that, he told himself, was why he was so eager to keep observing their partnership, because he sensed Booth knew what the nuance was.

He sensed it was the key to everything concealed within Temperance Brennan's fortress walls.

Brennan had paused at the compliment, seemed both defensive and unsettled as she settled in beside Booth. "Oh, thank you. I was supposed to go to … a gallery opening tonight." She shrugged off her semi-formal attire casually, as if the way she was dressed and the fact that she had entered at Booth's side were mere coincidence.

Booth smirked. "Why, did Jason get a new tight suit?"

She didn't rise to the bait, only corrected him. "With Mark."

"Oh, yeah," Sweets hummed, trying to insert himself into the discussion and act as if he weren't inappropriately interested in her love life. Booth had dragged him along (both before and now for this, tonight?) and so he had a valid excuse to play along. "The two amigos."

"I thought Mark was more of your 'stay-at-home' kind of a guy," Booth teased.

"I was visiting the possibility that I might enjoy him in a strictly conversational setting."

He already knew how it must have played out. After all, he was the one who'd just met her at the gallery opening because she'd called _him_. Mark was nowhere to be seen. So he prompted her. "And….?"

To Sweets, Brennan reported, "Since the murder I'm … reconsidering the argument for monogamy."

Booth chortled. "Write that one down, Sweets. I have a positive influence on her."

"No you don't," she scoffed.

Confidently, he countered, "Yes I do."

"Mark broke up with me," she admitted quietly.

"Oh," Booth said, frankly surprised and actually feeling a bit sympathetic even though he was not so secretly thrilled. And, he'd already warned her this would happen. "Sorry. What about Gay Jason?"

"Him, too." Awkwardly, she admitted another error. "I guess they weren't as accepting of each other as I thought. So…"

Shocked at this conversation, at everything he'd witnessed between them over the last few days, Sweets finally asked the question that was burning a hole in his mouth. Was this … normal? For them? Was he missing something, or finally seeing something he'd been missing all along? "Is it typical for you two to discuss your love lives?"

Booth answered with surprising speed, but only to put her further out for scrutiny. "Well, only when she has naked men in her apartment."

"No, that's not true," she insisted. "I'm very open about my relationships, as opposed to _you_."

Something was hidden in that, Sweets suspected.

Cam. A concealed relationship. Hidden coffee dates.

_ "You kept your relationship with Portia Frampton a secret," Brennan observed._

_"Well, that doesn't mean I didn't love her," the young lord defended._

_"Where we come from, that's exactly what it means," Booth countered._

_Brennan felt another small slice of disillusionment but her face betrayed nothing. _

Sensing the hidden dig, Booth reacted defensively. "Okay, what's that supposed to mean?"

"You're very secretive, as if discussing your sex life would somehow be offensive to me." She wasn't looking at him, but added, "I assume you're sexually active."

He was looking directly at her. "I do fine," and there was another message hidden within, a reassurance as well as a warning to drop it.

"Does it seem that your partnership provides a surrogate relationship, making it more difficult to form other bonds?"

Sweets had interjected his own observation, noting the rise in tension between them that suggested ancient arguments being played out and an intimacy that belied mere coworkers. Suddenly he was seeing things he'd never seen before because, he realized with shock, Booth _wanted_ him to see what they really were. This was why Booth had extracted this particular punishment: Sweets was supposed to fix what he'd broken, to see the real damage he'd done to them both with that one significant omission of fact.

It was Brennan who answered, an admission of sorts. "A surrogate relationship wouldn't necessarily be such a bad thing, because then I could avoid the sting of rejection which, however fleeting, is still uncomfortable."

Booth listened to her, and to what she was telling him. A surrogate, standing in for the real thing, could be the real thing pretending to be the surrogate. Was that what she meant, opening the door to more again but this time in a way that wouldn't force them to hide so much? Did it mean she was giving up this plot to torment him already? Brennan wasn't meeting his eyes but Booth felt the first embers of hope cautiously rekindling. She finally glanced at him, and it was there, her own hesitant hope. The test wasn't over but she wanted him to pass. She _needed_ him to pass every test she hurled his way.

_Oh, Bones._ He was going to stand firm, to show her that he meant it. Once upon a time he'd promised that he would never betray her, and he'd promised that he would never give up. Now more than ever, she needed him to prove his constancy when every other relationship she'd ever known had fractured. Prove love can last forever.

"Right," Booth agreed softly. Her abrupt rejection had stung, but he understood why and he wasn't going to let it stop him, especially not now with the door cracking open again. "Look, I'm sorry. You know what, if Mark and Jason don't know how lucky they are? They don't deserve you in the first place."

Defenses were coming back up, because he knew he'd pushed in too hard before and she wasn't ready for him to criticize her choices. That wasn't what she needed to hear.

Brennan shook her head, denying him, defending herself from further pain. "All relationships are temporary."

"No, that's not true, Bones. You're wrong." Her fragile trust was broken into tiny pieces that would take time to gather and restore, but if Temperance Brennan could reassemble a skull shattered into a thousand pieces, then Seeley Booth could reassemble her shattered heart. For a moment, they both forgot where they were, who was listening. Booth had her wounded gaze locked on his and put all the assurance he felt into the promise of forever. "There is someone for everyone, someone you're _meant_ to spend the rest of your life with. All right? You just have to be _open_ enough to see it. That's all."

_It's me,_ his eyes told her. _I'm the one who will never leave you._ Even if they could only be friends, he would stay beside her forever because love is forever.

He saw the impact it had on her, the way her chest moved with each breath, the way she wanted to believe him and must fight her own fear to keep trying. He saw her wavering, the promise working its slow magic on her and knew that was enough, at least for now.

"Come on, I'll buy you dinner," Booth abruptly commanded, sensing Sweets had heard enough. When she started to object (because a diner date was too close to coffee), he teased, "Hey, I can be fun in a strictly conversational setting."

Sweets had watched the entire exchange like the third wheel that he was, now just barely concealing his amazement at what he'd been permitted to witness. "See? Surrogate relationship."

"Surrogate nothing," Booth discarded. They were coffee and fate, and this was nothing but time to mend the wound. "It's only a meal, with drinks. Strictly _conversational_."

"So I can come, too," Sweets hinted.

Booth was acting the courtly gentleman, helping Brennan into her coat, and as she willingly turned under her partner's guiding hands she was the one who shut Sweets out. "Actually, our partnership does make it difficult to form other bonds. No offense."

They left bickering, a marked contrast to their silent entrance. Sweets scuttled back to his desk and jotted notes furiously, before he forgot any details.

Out in the parking structure, Booth paused before opening the car door for her. "You said that on purpose, didn't you."

"Said what, that Wong Foos shouldn't have closed?"

"That thing about surrogate relationships. You basically arranged for us to carry on right under his nose."

Booth was an intelligent man, she reminded herself, somehow both pleased and unprepared at how quick he could be. "I'm not ready for that," she insisted.

Maybe she never would be again. Brennan wasn't sure of anything lately, other than how awful it had felt to hide because it left her wondering how to act, how to feel, and what any of his actions meant since he'd returned from the dead. If she ever became ready again, next time she would not consent to hiding them so thoroughly.

"But when you are, he won't question a thing," Booth realized, thoroughly impressed with her ability to seize an opportunity in the blink of an eye. She still looked troubled, however, so he offered her nothing more than constancy. "I meant it, Bones. I won't pressure you, but I'm not going to give up."

"Because a straight male would never be satisfied in a platonic relationship?" she asked wearily.

"No," he assured her softly. "Because I love you. Of course I want to make love with you, but the reason I'm here has nothing to do with sex."

"I don't understand." Didn't men always want sex? Didn't they use the promise of love to snare females? Brennan shook her head, feeling her heart thunder with remembered passion when he'd pushed her down and covered her body with his. Not once had he whispered of love, while other men she'd been with had only groaned out declarations in the tumult of their anticipated orgasms. Why was he telling her now, when sex was taken out of the equation?

"I know you don't. But you will some day."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who is reading this story. I write for fun, but I post it for you. It's nice to know someone is enjoying the fruits of my favorite pastime. :)


	33. The Extraordinary in the Action

Author's Note: Things are slowly mending among all of our beloved characters. We're getting closer to something amazing, something we've been yearning to see for years by this point.

And on a completely different note, this is what I love about the Internet. A few well-placed queries allows me to write with fair confidence that Booth might have watched either of two Philadephia Flyers vs. Pittsburg Penguins Eastern conference quarter-final games on 19 and/or 21 April, which is right when Double Death of the Dearly Departed aired (20 April 2009). Ha! How's that for authentic details...?

* * *

~Q~

The Extraordinary in the Action

~Q~

**What made me love thee? let that persuade thee **  
** there's something extraordinary in thee. I cannot: but I love thee; none **  
** but thee; and thou deservest it. **

_The Merry Wives of Windsor, Act III, Scene 3, Lines 59-61_

~Q~

**September 2008**

"I had the strangest conversation with Sweets today."

Angela had just wandered into Brennan's office and helped herself to a seat, slouching on the sofa and pawing through a new issue of Archeology left out on Brennan's coffee table as something to do while she waited for her to take the bait.

"That's good," Brennan replied with nary a nibble. It sounded more like dismissal.

"You know what he said?" A figurine from Tikal caught Angela's eye as she flipped through. The small male figure was reddish orange, squatting on a stool made of bone and gazing down at a skull in its palms. Was this a classical Mayan anthropologist? Angela smirked down at the color photo, knowing Brennan probably wouldn't appreciate the joke.

"Obviously I do not, since I was not in attendance."

Right. Chuckling at the snark, sensing it was directed towards Sweets (not herself), she returned the magazine to the table and turned to the reason for her visit. "He asked me why I think my relationship with Jack was a failed one. Can you believe that?"

Brennan finally halted her avoidance tactic of the moment (narrative reports from the most recent case she and Booth were investigating) and looked up at last with a frown. "I have no reason to doubt your veracity."

"No, I mean ... why would he say it's a failure just because we aren't living together anymore? Right? I mean, it was a great relationship. It was."

Brennan's eyes softened immediately, knowing that Angela spoke of Jack Hodgins quite frequently with a wistful tone, which probably indicated she still harbored feelings of affection towards him. "So, you believe that a failed relationship is one that was never successful?"

Shifting, sighing, the artist brushed back a loose tendril and tried to articulate what she'd concluded, because the surest test of the soundness of her recent epiphany was getting agreement from Brennan. "We're still working together, and you were right. We're still friends. It's still a little awkward, but..."

"Not as bad as you feared?"

"No."

With a dismissive shake of her head Brennan pointed out, "Sweets might argue that you failed in your attempt at sustained monogamy."

That's what society would say. Angela shrugged it off quickly; she was an artist and artists disdained convention as a matter of principle. "Well, I don't care what he thinks, but when he said that it occurred to me ... relationships shift and change. They're never static."

"True," her ultra rational friend agreed.

"I just ... do you think they're always going to be in our lives?"

"Who," she asked, but Brennan already thought she knew where Angela was headed. It was a question she'd been asking herself, and it heartened her to hear Angela asking it, too. Maybe it meant there was the possibility.

"If they're always in our lives, then it can never be a failed relationship. Only a changed one."

Everything changes, but perhaps Booth was correct when he said there are some people you are meant to spend the rest of your life with. For the first time since that night, she acknowledged her gradually growing hope that it was true.

~Q~

Dr. Zack Addy always acted with deliberate purpose.

In his current environment, he read books that would further his own understanding of the mentally ill, of the process of decision making, and of ethical and moral responsibility. He carefully obeyed the rules of the McKinley psychiatric facility where he was currently an inmate who was not free to leave, (and yet not there entirely against his will) because doing so facilitated his access to reading materials and in general it made his life easier.

Receiving therapeutic visits from Dr. Lance Sweets at first surprised him, but eventually Zack reasoned that either Agent Booth or Dr. Brennan was behind Dr. Sweets's sudden interest in his welfare. He never asked why, only gamely cooperated with the questions as far as honesty would allow him, but he knew he'd frustrated Sweets on more than one occasion because he continued to deny possessing feelings of guilt over his role in the downfall of "the master." Zack was not sorry for what he'd done about Gormogon, only for failing to see his own incapacity to act with utterly dispassionate logic.

There was still one final task undone, an errand of explanation.

As before, when opportunities aligned and Zack saw the moment to act had arrived, he left the safe haven at McKinley so he could achieve his final objective. He passed through the halls of the Jeffersonian alone, wistfully, knowing he would never do so again. As he entered the lab and beheld a young man standing beside Dr. Brennan (his replacement, no doubt, because a Master always needs an apprentice), Zack pushed down his unruly emotions and offered the rationalization for his escape.

He could help them with their current case.

Everyone turned in surprise, but it was Brennan (no longer his Master) who rushed at him and embraced him first. Her forgiveness was a balm to his lingering doubts. Maybe she understood and he'd taken this final risk unnecessarily, yet a moment later when Zack found himself surrounded by the people who still loved and understood him, who forgave what they didn't understand, he decided that all of it had been worthwhile. Keeping this family together was just as desirable an end as bringing down the false master. Agent Booth was the one who took command, who arranged the audience with Dr. Brennan. After giving his final gift to her, (his own ease with numbers and patterns that revealed a pathological obsession with the number 12 and that in turn led to a suspect), Zack turned to Agent Booth to make a request.

"Would you allow me a few moments alone with Doctor Brennan? You have my assurance that I won't harm her or attempt to escape your custody."

Agent Booth gave him a long, assessing stare but he finally nodded and left the two anthropologists alone.

"You're working together well, I see," Zack opined softly. It was gratifying to have evidence, to have this assurance that he'd achieved the greatest good for the public, but also for her.

"Yes," she confirmed but her faintly crooked smile was for Zack, revealing that she was very glad to see him. After a long moment it faded and she expressed worry instead. "Why did you escape and come here, Zack? You could have just phoned us."

This was the purpose for temporary truancy, this opportunity to tell her what he planned even at the risk of losing that very thing. "My parents have been in contact with the director at McKinley and made arrangements for my care to be transferred to Minnesota. Understandably, they want to be near me."

She nodded, her eyes shimmering like a sunlit stream.

"Assuming my absence tonight is not detected, the length of my continued incarceration hinges upon my perceptions regarding my actions, and the way I take responsibility for them. If I eventually come to recognize my own mental illness as a cause of my delusion, I will be deemed no longer a threat to myself or to others. I will be allowed to return to society."

Brennan looked away at that, taking a breath and thinking. When her gaze came back, it was troubled. "You're not delusional, Zack."

"Once I am in the custody of the state of Minnesota, it will benefit me to cooperate fully with the therapy regimen. I will confess to culpability and obtain my freedom."

"Zack." And her voice cracked.

"I am culpable," he reminded her. "I broke several laws and my actions resulted in the murder of a man."

Her faith in him had taken a blow, but it still held firm. The proof of that had already arrived in the form of her welcoming embrace, and in what she said now with so much certainty, because she really did know. "You didn't kill him."

"The most expeditious way to obtain my freedom is for me to accept responsibility for his death and submit to treatment." That was the most rational plan, one he had carefully worked out from the beginning as a way to evade the Gormogon master's anticipated effort to kill him. Zack had known being murdered was also a risk, given the fate of one of the exposed apprentices, who had been killed in jail. "Otherwise, because of my other crimes I will be forced to remain here in a detention facility for several years, hoping for parole."

"I understand," she said softly.

"Then you also understand why no one else can know I'm innocent of a literal act of murder."

She did, he'd always known she would. Doctor Brennan nodded solemnly, vowing to keep his secret so he could rejoin his family and earn his freedom more painlessly than prison would permit.

Agent Booth drove him back to meet Dr. Sweets at the McKinley back door. They didn't speak much but something about the way Booth kept glancing at him made him wonder if Booth also suspected him of genius rather than insanity. Finally, he decided to ask a secondary question. "Why did you leave me alone with her?"

"I knew you escaped and came to her for a reason."

A simple answer, elegant like Occam's Razor. Zack pondered that for a moment and wondered what information Booth had utilized to form such an assumption. It was one of the reasons Agent Booth worked so well with Dr Brennan, Zack supposed. The intelligent man had his own genius, his own way of guessing people's true natures and intentions, and Zack welcomed this final piece of evidence that he'd made the best decision when he ensured Agent Booth would get a chance to withstand Dr. Brennan's initial anger.

They were together, and that was the greatest good.

~Q~

**November 2008**

Two steps forward and one step back meant progress was slow but steady. Booth watched his partner raise her glass and toast him on his birthday, giving a public apology for doubting him that only he fully understood. Somehow, despite the argument and the mistrust that had erupted between them only hours ago, he sensed this apology was about more than letting Jared influence her. It was about more than praise, or reassurance of his worth.

He hoped she was telling him the test was over.

One step back, but two steps forward. When she brought him cake and echoed his own words from months ago, "Do you need time and space?" he couldn't help but chuckle. "Just time," he assured her, because the person he was currently nursing a grudge towards was none other than his kid brother, and not even because of Jared's stunt with Brennan. It was all about the drinking and the collateral damage alcoholism caused.

Taking a stab of chocolate cake, he considered his partnership, all the steps they'd taken together over these years and the steps he still needed to take in order to assure her of his intentions. Once upon a time, he'd told her partners shared things to build trust. "My dad drank," he said softly, stepping closer to her than he'd ever stepped towards anyone other than Cam, (and only because Cam had been around so far in the distant past as to have witnessed it first hand).

Brennan paused in mid-bite, her eyes rounding, and the fork that had approached her mouth slowly lowered back down. Hesitantly, she offered "You don't have to tell me."

"I want to tell you," he countered. Yet he said nothing else, sensing for now that just that single confession was enough.

"I always thought you led an idyllic life," she admitted after another minute of silent contemplation. "You spoke of being popular and of your athletic and sexual prowess—"

"Bones," he blushed.

"—But aside from their occupations, you've never spoken of your parents. Is that why?"

It was shockingly easy to turn to her and just say it all, insanely easy because he knew she would just get it, the truths hidden in the painful spaces between what he told her and what he'd never have to say. Bones would understand what the gaps meant. He picked up her one free hand, so skilled and capable and yet so finely boned and delicate in his larger, blood-stained ones. (Delicate, her skin and muscles also pierced by a bullet today, her arm in a sling, and it was just one more reminder of how dangerous it was for her to be his partner.) He held her hand and looked into his partner's eyes while he let her in enough to see his darkness.

"When I was fourteen and Jared was ten, he threw a ball and broke the neighbor's window on a dare from Frankie Marucci, this _idiot_ kid that lived down the street. The guy was home, Mr. Lieberman, who of course came running out to see what happened. We were all out there with a bat and glove, but if he found out it was on purpose, you know, he was going to tell our dad and our dad would kill Jared. So, I told him I'd thrown it too hard on accident and Jared missed the catch."

"You took the blame?"

"Yeah. Mr. Lieberman dragged us both home and told our dad. And Dad was pissed off because it was going to cost a hundred dollars to fix Mr. Lieberman's window, his living room window. Dad promised it would be repaired within a couple of days, which was fine. I was okay with paying and even doing the work myself." He swallowed then, as if choking on the recollection. "As soon as he had us alone, Dad started screaming and throwing things, talking about how I'd humiliated him. Then he began punching and kicking me."

Then he stopped, closing his eyes to withdraw from the memory of bloodshot eyes and spittle-spiced insults.

"Where was your mom," Brennan asked quietly, knowing the answer would tell her a great deal more than simple location.

It was his own history and still he had to force it out, had to push words past instinct even just to tell the person he most wanted to know. "She called Pops, my grandfather. My dad's dad. She called him, told him to come get us. He got over to the house pretty fast—Dad was still beating me when Pops walked in and started yelling at him to stop. That's the day Pops took me and Jared in, and Mom left. I only saw her a few times after that."

Brennan exhaled the question as a painful sigh. "Why?"

For this he had no answer, nothing but speculation and a smattering of wisdom gleaned from being a father to his own son. "Maybe she felt guilty for not being able to take care of us. The last time I saw her, right after I graduated high school, she told me she was glad I had my grandfather and that she was sorry." He laughed bitterly. "I was 18."

She didn't say anything, just set the cake aside and rested her hand on his arm. Just touched him, and he smiled down at the slender appendage that did so much to him with a simple touch. Little moments like these revealed her heart to him, showed him what he was striving for and that it was well worth the detours and delays just to feel the touch of her love.

"Hey, I just realized," he said softly.

"What?" Her eyes connected with his when he looked up. So close now, he thought. Getting close again. "It's my birthday and you owe me a dance."

"I do?" She furrowed her brow, clearly surprised by this hitherto unknown obligation.

"You do," he affirmed. Taking her hand, he pulled her back into the Founding Fathers with him and they danced to the tune of laughter and friends, to a celebration that showed every relationship she'd thought was lost could still be restored.

~Q~

Steps forward and back, into the dark and out again. She saved him from water and ice, from over-sexed scientists and from himself when his doubts got the better of him. And though her praise arrived in the form of backhanded compliments more often than not, he knew what she meant when she said she would only work with the best. Or that he was made of good stuff. Or that he was an excellent father.

He knew it meant she loved him.

~Q~

**April 2009**

A quasi-argument had escorted the two of them all the way from Booth's apartment to the door where they now halted and ended the skirmish with dueling gazes. Brennan won, of course. Booth watched her hand reach for the door, her face set in determined lines and she was the one who opened that door.

She was.

Brennan went in first, spoke first, with only the smallest trace of hesitation. "Sweets? Hi."

And Booth followed, because he was her partner (which she was probably counting on) and if Brennan could somehow find it in herself to do _this_, then he could not do anything less than rise to the occasion and extend an offer to dinner. Just a quick meal, no big deal.

Young Lance Sweets was seated at a work table with his back to the door. At the sound of the door opening and Brennan's tentative greeting he turned, surprised to see them both so late into the evening without having called ahead. It shouldn't be surprising that the question came out guarded. "What are you doing here?"

So she had opened the door and led him in there, but it was Booth who extended the invitation. "Well, uh, Gordon Gordon is making dinner for us at my place, 'family style,' and you're invited." Join the family, kid. It's a one-time offer: take it or leave it.

Turning them down came automatically because Sweets knew Gordon must have sent them and the thought of their pity (even if they didn't know that's what it was) was unbearable. "Thank you but, I've actually got a lot of work here."

Right, see, this was a waste of time. Gordon was barking up the wrong tree, talking about baby ducks and foundlings. Booth pivoted, already retreating but his partner stayed. She pulled a breath and blurted out ... God, what the hell was she saying?! Briskly but with rapidly attenuating strength, she told a simple story that horrified her audience by the very stark absence of detail.

Because that's how they both knew it was real.

"My foster parents locked me in the trunk of a car for two days when I broke a dish. I was a very clumsy child. They warned me it would happen, but the water was so hot and the ... soap was so slippery." Though she had started out detached, professionally reporting the facts as if before a courtroom, by the time she mentioned slippery soap, the control slipped out of her grasp just as easily as that doomed dish had in her teens.

_"Today wasn't the first time Brennan's been locked in the dark. It's not the second time either."_ Angela had said that, after mentioning El Salvador. And Brennan that night, gasping and denying she'd dreamed of '_that_ car.' Tunnel vision swept every object out of his view, everything but her. Helpless rage (because it was so far in the past that there was nothing he could do about it); outraged jealousy (because she was telling this to Sweets, and she'd never confessed anything so horrific to Booth); searing guilt (to be jealous at a time like this, when he knew she was breaking right before his very eyes).

Sweets noticed Agent Booth had halted in annoyance, watching her with an expression Sweets found difficult to read. This was unexpected, perhaps even undesired, but after the initial shock he was undoubtedly experiencing a torrent of conflicting impulses. Brennan turned to Booth at this point, exposing tears and a tremor as she added. "I still don't think it was fair, even though they gave me fair warning."

Not fair.

The childish complaint over childish injustices struck both men at once. Not fair to lock a person in a car trunk for any reason, lacking water or food, or a sanitary way to dispose of waste. Lacking climate control perhaps, meaning it may have been extremely hot or cold. Most certainly it had been dark, lonely, and terrifying. All over a broken piece of crockery. And, no that was not fair. Not a commensurate punishment by any stretch of whatever convoluted rationalization her foster parents may have invented.

"The water was so hot." Here she actually did cry, her voice shaking, her gaze locked onto her partner's as if seeking strength from him. As if she knew she could count on it.

"No," Sweets agreed softly, somehow speaking to the childish part of her that still carried scars and fears from being locked into a black, bleak hell for two days. "No it wasn't fair at all. It wasn't your fault."

Watching her, Booth pulled out his handkerchief and held it out to her but he also hissed a question. "Bones, what are you doing?" She was crying, letting the walls fall, radiating the pain and beauty that made her impossible to resist. Did she know the power she had to turn men's hearts? Was this intentional?

She turned to him with the slightly bewildered realization that Booth didn't understand. "You said that scars on the back was a metaphor. Isn't that why we're here? To metaphorically compare scars?"

So she'd stripped naked? (Metaphorically) Frowning and vaguely horrified, Booth groaned, "I just came here to to bring Sweets back to my place for dinner. That's all."

This was exactly what Sweets had originally guessed, and he wasn't wrong. It _was_ a mission of pity. "Scars on the back?"

Brennan lifted the handkerchief to her nose, capturing trace evidence of her precarious emotional state, and once again turned to Booth as if seeking something from him, but he didn't intervene. Without his help she turned and forged ahead, revealing that she truly was acting alone. Brennan admitted, "I saw them, Sweets."

It shocked him, but pity was intolerable. Reflecting on his own very conflicted emotions, Sweets stood, facing them with barely salvaged pride and a belligerent challenge. "So, what. You decided to just share something from your past?"

The defensive question should have put her off. Instead, she nodded slightly and met his eyes with her own, with an empathy that reached so deeply into his soul that he felt it as an almost physical touch. This was the first time he'd ever met somebody who _understood_. But more than that, Lance Sweets felt his heart race as he perceived what she'd really done, why she'd done it. And how.

Exposed herself, to draw him close. Forgiveness like he'd never seen before. And a sophisticated demonstration of psychological insight, the like of which he had never imagined possible from her, both in knowing why he'd refused and in knowing how to force his hand.

"That is so ... unlike you," he said softly. (No, some part of him realized with growing awe, this is only unlike what you thought she was capable of.) The depth of his misjudgment of her shook him as the words left his mouth and with that utterance the unguarded intimacy was already a thing of the past.

She drew in a breath sharply, sensing she'd been discovered. "I still hate psychology." But she knew how to use it.

As he watched in amazement, Brennan turned to her partner and threw out the challenge. "Okay, your turn. Go"

Again, an almost bewildered refusal, as if she'd asked him to dance naked under a full moon. (And let's face it: in a way, she had.) "I came here to bring Sweets back to my place for dinner. That's all."

It proved Brennan's heart was the driving force tonight. This, _this_ was the mystery he'd sensed, the part of her that Booth knew, the question Sweets had been seeking to answer.

Dr Temperance Brennan was cold and guarded, nearly impossible to reach. She was abrasive and arrogant, unapologetically so. Despite that, she'd somehow won the devotion of Agent Booth, a gruff FBI Deputy Director (Cullen), a cantankerous Federal Prosecutor (Caroline Julian), indeed just about everyone she worked with. How was it possible?

Agent Booth was friendly but still distant because of the experiment so many months ago and Brennan had avoided all contact except when absolutely necessary. When forced into his company, she'd dug in repeated slights and insults as her way of pushing him back. Out of the two of them, if Sweets had been forced to guess which one would try to reach out, it would have been Booth. Absolutely, he would have anticipated Booth's forgiveness and generosity to come knocking 100 times over before Brennan thawed.

And yet... and yet, she'd come in first. She'd spoken first, the moment he declined. She'd exposed herself first. And now she was giving her partner a pleading glance that no man would ever be able to resist. Brennan's eyes seemed to glow, her head tilting and just _that_, whatever it was, hit the tough agent squarely in the heart. It hit Sweets, too, with a revelation, because she looked so vulnerable and so beautiful that a protective instinct rose out of both of them.

"Okay," Booth capitulated, looking only at her. Speaking only to her. "If it wasn't for my grandfather I probably would have killed myself when I was a kid."

Immediately he turned and lashed at Sweets. "And that's all I'm going to say on the subject matter! Understand?"

Pivoting back to her like a needle seeking true north, Booth asked gently, "Are you okay, Bones?"

And just like that, Sweets knew Booth was in love with her and that _she_ knew it, too. That protective instinct, and the way she'd looked at Booth, pleaded with him deliberately to bring it out: Brennan knew psychology well enough to use it when she had to. Sweets swallowed his astonishment and continued watching, turning his attention to her.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Here." She folded the handkerchief, almost nervously, but then tucked it into his jacket pocket, right over her partner's heart. Tucked it and patted it and held her hand there, just slightly to the left of his sternum which was directly where a soldier places his hand to pledge his allegiance, and their eyes were connected. Hers worried, his slightly dazed at the meaning in where she touched him.

Sweets held his breath, stunned that he'd missed it. She was in love with Booth but she had doubts, and Booth knew it. He was waiting her out.

A grin split his features wide open.

As if sensing his scrutiny, both turned to him. Brennan frowned. "Why are you nodding?"

"Nothing. Just ... Wyatt made an observation about you two and, I think I just saw what he saw."

~Q~

Everyone assumed they were a couple.

Suspects, squints, waitresses, random people on the street. Sometimes, during off hours, they held hands and walked the Mall to the Lincoln Memorial and his favorite coffee cart. Every evening was spent together. He picked her up in the mornings, or she got him; either way, they commuted together. They were together all the time, in every way but one, so naturally everyone assumed they were a couple.

Booth knew Brennan loved him but the fear of loss still held her back. She would question, he would reassure her that life was risky and love was worth the price of pain. Patiently, he held steady and watched her drifting back towards him, warmed by the small pieces of her heart she deposited with him here and there in the form of actions.

Fixing his back  
Bringing him soup from Mama's  
Staying up all night to ice skate hand in hand  
Promising she would return to his grave to speak to him

This was the biggest piece yet, the proof that last year's loss was finally fading and she had begun to really recover. He slipped his arm around her shoulders, walking her away from another man's grave and felt her arm going across his back as well. They walked in step, side by side to the car where he stopped to question her. "What do you want to do now?"

She wanted to forget he'd ever died, but rather than reminding him Brennan shrugged and offered what she figured he might enjoy best. "We could go home and you can watch the Flyers."

He stopped them beside the passenger door, grinning. "How do you know about that?"

"It's play ups, right?"

"Play-_offs._ For the Stanley Cup, right. Flyers versus Penguins, Philly versus Pitt. Can you believe that?"

Her wide, uncertain eyes revealed not a lack of belief so much as a lack of comprehension.

It made him chuckle, now even more charmed by her offer. "You really want to watch hockey with me?"

At her hesitant nod (what was she getting herself into?) Booth grinned again and impulsively kissed her. Light, fast, unexpected. He'd surprised her enough that she stiffened and searched his eyes for an explanation.

"Booth?"

"Yeah," he asked gruffly, suddenly worried that he'd stepped over her line a little too far, a little too early.

"Do you love me?"

"Yeah, I do."

"How do you know?"

"I just know," he assured her. And he did know, as surely as he knew he loved his son Parker, or that hockey was his favorite sport. (Although he'd played basketball better and had even hoped of a professional career, hockey's wild unpredictability made it more entertaining to watch). He knew he loved her as easily as he knew her names (all of them), or the color of her eyes right now when they were standing under an umbrella together on this rainy afternoon (slate).

Some things you simply know.

Brennan frowned, thoroughly dissatisfied with his answer. Such surety seemed so far beyond her grasp, arcane knowing that she could never hope to reach. How could he know? How could _she_?

Fondly, he watched her puzzlement unfold and finally couldn't help offering what he knew she was looking for. "Do you want me to prove it to you?"

"Can you?"

"I'm doing it right now." Taking her face between his palms, he marveled that a thirty-three year old woman could look so sweetly innocent at times like these. Sliding his lips against hers in caressing strokes, he pressed into her, teasing and retreating until she moaned and that was his cue to finally pull away.

Her bright eyes locked onto his, filling with curious longing and unflagging reason. "Kissing proves love?"

"No, letting you go does." He opened the car door and helped her into her seat. "When you're ready, you'll come to me."

And she was almost ready. He knew that, too.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: No matter how ready we think we are, life always manages to throw a few surprises at us. For all of you who are still reading, thank you for sticking with me this long. :)


	34. The End in the Beginning

Author's Note: So, I've dropped little hints and clues along the way, but now I'll tell you that there is one line from the 100th episode that is driving this entire "slightly AU" romance. You'll hear the line soon but for now, that line gave birth to this interpretation. That, plus something Hart Hanson once said: "The title is very literal."

* * *

~Q~

The End in the Beginning

~Q~

**To die, to sleep—**  
**No more—and by a sleep to say we end**  
**The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks**  
**That flesh is heir to. 'Tis a consummation**  
**Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep—**  
**To sleep********—**perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub,   
**For in that sleep of death what dreams may come**

_Hamlet, Act III, Scene 1, lines 55-61_

~Q~

The bones never stopped whispering when she was near, but Brennan had learned she could avoid them by avoiding the lab. She left more and more of the work to her rotating cast of interns and mostly that kept the restless whispers at bay. Having less experienced interns meant that occasionally a question arose that only the bones themselves could answer and when that happened, Brennan sequestered herself in the Bone Room. Lately she'd begun noticing someone always seemed to stay with her and wondered if they did it to stave off her complete submersion.

On one such occasion, the bones of a college kid nicknamed 'Beaver' had been so badly battered by a blunderbuss that her Persian intern could not identify which particular insult had ended the Beaver's illustrious career as an emerging criminal. Cam had also failed to find cause of death; and Angela's calculations of a fall demonstrated the Beaver had not fallen far enough to kill himself. It rested on Brennan now.

As they prepared to send Brennan off towards her calling, Angela turned with a sigh to Cam. "You know what this means?"

And Cam, no longer an outsider but now firmly ensconced within her Jeffersonian family, answered with her usual pointed wit. "Dr. Brennan is going to stare at the bones until they speak to her."

Angela raised her brow and glibly offered, "So, rock, paper, scissors to see who stays to babysit her."

"Yep," Cam sighed. And lost. Twice. (Worst out of three.)

Normally Cam stayed out of Brennan's way when a bone reading was taking place because it was rather like watching someone meditate. Brennan moved fluidly, her hands and eyes sliding over the bones like running water, but other than that it was a long, silent vigil and Cam had never been one for standing still. On this night, however, Cam indulged in some loitering just outside the doorway so she could watch for a few moments.

Arastoo Vasiri had already laid the young man's badly damaged bones out on the lit table in the Bone Room and as Brennan took each bone in hand to examine the pocked, divoted, pierced, gouged, cracked and broken surface a sort of whisper ghosted through the room. At times she paused and closed her eyes. These were the times Angela insisted Brennan was hearing something.

Cam wasn't sure, but she almost thought she could hear something, too.

The anthropologist had already worked her way through the appendicular skeleton, eliminating arms and legs fairly quickly. When she reached the axial bones, she slowed down. To the skull, Brennan hitched up one corner of her mouth in faint disapproval. "You were a thoroughly reprehensible individual. Booth says young men need to be bad in order to be good. I do not see the logic, but if he's correct you were destined to be a saint."

Clapping a hand over her mouth, Cam turned and darted out of earshot before Brennan heard her laugh. She took herself off to her office where she could chuckle freely and make a phone call to let Michelle know she'd be another couple of hours. Though she had complained about having to stick around the truth was, Cam really didn't mind doing it. It seemed a small sacrifice, especially after Brennan had somehow reasoned her into adopting Michelle.

Michelle's father had been murdered, leaving the sixteen year old an orphan. She was the daughter of a man Cam had nearly married, the almost-a-daughter she'd had to leave behind so many years ago, and seeing Michelle again had brought up painful memories of that one relationship Cam could never truly forget. Though Brennan had not really said anything to suggest she was affected by the parallel to her own teen-aged tragedy, she'd dropped a few observations about the rational choice Cam faced: adopt Michelle herself because of the closeness they'd once shared, or let the girl vanish into foster care. Thanks to Brennan's heartfelt attack of logic, Michelle now lived with Cam instead of with distant relatives or worse, with strangers.

Taking a cup of fresh coffee to the still prickly anthropologist a couple of hours later, Cam had to admit that a lost night of sleep and a proffered cup of coffee could only begin to repay the debt she owed. She'd never thought that being a mother could be so satisfying. She'd never thought that she would have Brennan (of all people) to thank for that, both for her becoming a mother and for the resulting discovery that she so enjoyed having someone to care about.

When she returned a third time about thirty minutes later, she saw Brennan's expression had changed to one of pain. She held aloft the sternum, her fingertip plugging a tiny hole no larger than the tip of a ball-point pen. Shadows moved across the anthropologist's eyes, a sorrowful sort of regret as she whispered, "You were foolish to pull it out."

Then she raised her voice to call out. "Cam!"

And Cam was there to receive the fruits of Brennan's unique vision. Little did she know that watching her change of heart regarding the merits of motherhood was working an entirely different change in the anthropologist who'd set her on this path.

~Q~

There are tests, and then there are inquisitions.

"I want a baby!"

That's how it all started, with a childish game.

Sweets, of course, had tried to dress it up as some sort of tried and true method for emotional evaluation. "This is a valuable psychological tool. When you respond viscerally, we can get to the root of your emotional issues and figure out what binds you two together as partners."

So, what bound them together...? Apparently, Temperance Brennan's hitherto unknown desire to bring forth progeny sharing 50% of certified Seeley Joseph Booth DNA. Not just any baby ... _his_ baby.

"All I need is some sperm. You'd make a good donor."

"This is all your fault!" Booth hissed at Sweets (who after this revelation spent the next ten minutes blinking and gulping like a guppy tossed out of its tank).

Booth endured her insane rationalizations right up to the point of (Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for this sinner so that God will forgive me for the sin of abusing my body but I'm doing it for her) going to a sperm bank to make a deposit. He endured her promises of legally binding documents that would absolve him of all responsibility for the baby she wanted from him, even knowing how he felt about the responsibilities of fatherhood. He'd tried to go along, nursing a headache and heartache because this was just wrong, and finally he couldn't take it any longer.

No.

Just ... NO.

"Bones, I can't do this. You know I can't _do_ this. It's not right!"

He'd come to her apartment to confront her: to explain, as gently as he could, why the only way he could pass this test was to show her she was wrong to ask him in the first place.

"All I want is your sperm," she said again, as if she merely wanted a cup of sugar to bake her bun in the oven. Only the finest ingredients would do for a Brennan baby.

"All you want is a _baby_, part of me and part of you. You've been describing all of my wonderful attributes without admitting what this is really about."

Brennan scowled at him, arms crossed and a remarkably childish pout drawing down her lower lip. "High quality DNA is essential for a successful organism."

Organism?! Booth rubbed his hand over his eyes for a minute, feeling that headache throb again as he tried to batter past the wall of science so he could get her to acknowledge her real motive. Hell, even Sweets was onto her. "You love me. You know a baby will link us forever and you want that, but you're too afraid to just ask me. _Ask me_, Bones. Ask me for forever, and I'll give it to you."

He could see the fear in her, how it must tussle over the promises he made. Shadows and light played over the landscape of her face as she moved in and out of the lamp's reach, as she turned and told him what she knew. The only truth she'd ever known.

"Nothing lasts forever, Booth."

And here she was most definitely wrong, a fact that almost scared him because she couldn't have what she wanted unless she understood the error. He moved towards her, pushing her back another step into the full glow of the lamp, until the shadows retreated and light spilled over one smooth cheek but missed her eyes. "Parenthood is forever, for the rest of your life. You cannot walk away from a child. You know that, you know it takes one hundred percent commitment."

She was listening, at least, so he pressed his case. "You will never stop being a parent and neither will I."

"You won't leave Parker," she whispered, as if confirming something to herself. Booth was a good father, a good man. Compassion and courage and loyalty, traits not tracked by geneticists but they should be.

"I won't leave you, either," he finished. "But it's gotta be all or nothing. I can't give you my baby unless you're willing to take me, too. So please, let's just do this the right way."

So softly he almost didn't hear her, Brennan asked, "What's the right way?" Avoid entanglements, avoid risk, avoid heartbreak.

Another step back and the light hit her eyes at last, illuminating them.

"You let me love you. You let yourself love me. I know it's a risk, but the risk of loss and heartbreak you're trying to avoid with me will only be worse when it's your own child. Believe me."

_"I'd love my child, Booth. I would!"_ That's when it hit her, the risk she hadn't considered. Weakly, she dropped into a chair and held her head in her hands.

"If you could love my baby, why can't you love me?"

It was a question of logic, the only way to reach her. He left her then, knowing she had to be the one to decide.

She went to him during the final hour of the night, just as dawn approached and drew a thin white line on the horizon. Brennan let herself into his apartment (that silly synthetic rock was still there) and walked slowly towards his bedroom, shedding shoes and her jacket along the way. The clock beside his bed indicated the hour was 4:47, almost morning. When she reached his bed he turned over as if he'd been expecting her. Maybe he had, she mused sadly. He'd said as much, not too long ago. _"When you're ready you'll come to me."_

Lifting the blankets, he slid over and made room for her as she joined him.

"Do you love me?" she asked again, still so unsure.

"Yes." He smiled at this by now very familiar exchange. "Do you want me to prove it to you?"

"If you're not too sleepy." It was both an answer and a question, but she didn't know what form the proof would take this time.

He pulled her against him, his naked skin heating her to pure plasma. Proximity was all it took, nuclear attraction took over as he rolled her under him and they connected.

When two nuclei of like charges are brought together, the protons of one repel the protons of the other because of the electrostatic force. Opposites attract but like repels like, and as a wise psychologist had quite recently explained, these two were not opposites. When they are the same, this repelling force is stronger than any urge to fuse, thus keeping the nuclei separate for eternity ... unless an outside force propels them too close to resist the nuclear force. Get too close, and the nuclear force takes over.

They couldn't get close enough.

Bristled from a night of growing beard, his fervent movements scored her skin wherever he kissed her. His mouth battered hers, tongue probing and demanding entrance until she opened and let him in. His body weighted hers, pressing her down, one thigh slipping between hers to tease the aching hollow only he could fill. Brennan whispered encouragement as he gathered her closer and removed her clothing in a wild tangle of limbs and fabric.

Closer and closer, nuclear attraction pulls them together and when they collide fast enough, flashes of blinding white ecstasy fuse them together, the two becoming one new and unique element. Fusion requires the force of velocity times mass, speed and weight giving strength to the reaction as they lose themselves in each other.

They fell still for a spell, eyes locked and breaths metered in synchrony. A moment later he seemed to reach a decision. Deliberately, he rolled again and left her above him, her palms bracing against his chest as she found herself looking down. "Your decision," he told her softly. "Whatever you want."

He would never make that mistake again; he would never rush her again.

What she wanted was him, to touch him and with the permission granted, she indulged. Her hands flowed over the sea of exposed Booth, stroking his remarkably flawless texture. How could a man have such smooth skin over such firm musculature? How could he feel like flower petal silk and forged steel strength?

Giving in to every fantasy she'd never admitted harboring for him (not even to herself), Brennan thrilled to the sounds he emitted from the torment of her touch. He'd been doing this to her for far too long: the drift of his fingertips anywhere on her had always initiated a galvanic stream of tingling in their wake. Always, he touched her and she felt the shock. But as she stroked over him, the feeling of him bucking and trembling below her brought out a predatory smile, and the faint gleam of ownership. This time he was the one suffering streams of charged energy.

Eventually he suffered enough. Booth pulled her down and in a languid shift of position he surrounded her now (though she was still above him) and he was asking her again. "Do you want this? Do you want me?"

"Yes." Permission, acceptance, trust. One small word with so many meanings.

And then he was in. Slowly, tenderly, exquisitely _in_ and she felt it, the physics of love.

Two objects cannot occupy the same space, but when they do it the right way, they fuse into something else.

She felt him entering her through every portal, pouring into her streams of heat and love, chemicals and joy, pinnacles of pleasure she'd never known it was possible to reach. They moved together as one entity, united in purpose: get closer.

Making love is fusion, making something new out of separate elements.

A baby.

A life.

A single life, shared.

Proof arrived at last in the way their bodies clung and moved, in the thundering waves of energy that swept through her until nothing existed but ecstasy, followed immediately by adoration as she felt him joining her there. They were there together, so close, so intertwined, so much joy ... the miracle Booth had promised her in the Diner.

As the reaction abated they fell sated together, tangled up together, breathing the same air, gazes locked, as always. And she whispered it at last. "Booth ... I love you."

"I know," he murmured. "You never have to worry about that. I know who you are."

Then he sighed contentedly and settled her beside him. "Let's get some sleep."

To her everlasting amusement, Booth immediately surrendered to the stereotypically male post-coital exhaustion she'd observed in prior partners. She, on the other hand, felt energized and wide awake by the lingering effects of stimulation. So with nothing else to do she simply lay beside him and wondered how long it would take for sleep to overtake her.

Sleeping with another person was not something she'd had much experience with. Sully, of course, and Micheal, but those relationships had been less than a year in both cases. Booth only twice in all this time (undercover, both times).

Odd, Brennan reflected, just now noticing a pattern. Men she'd had a deeper emotional attachment with, she called them all by their surnames; men she had no particular fondness for went by their given names in her mind: Michael, David, Mark, Jason. She wondered what Sweets would say about it, then caught that, too. Sweets, not Lance. Hodgins, not Jack.

Except ... Zack had always been Zack, but that was like Russ always being Russ, and now she'd just confused herself over useless psychological ramblings. It didn't mean anything. With that mental chastisement settled, Brennan snuggled into Booth's chest (yes, _Booth_, she thought defiantly. Always he would be Booth and not Seeley) so she could close her eyes and turn off the flowing stream of thoughts and simply enjoy the pleasurable warmth that remained as an afterglow of their lovemaking.

Snuggling in beside him, she breathed deeply (scent is strongly linked to memory) and let memories of making love with Booth play in her mind's eye as she drifted off to sleep at last.

~Q~

Less than an hour later Booth startled awake when someone moved against him. He opened his eyes as a faint, feminine sigh tickled his chest and his partner shifted again. "Bones..."

She murmured something and blinked her eyes open. Booth, closer than he'd ever been but almost as close as she'd always wanted him to be, smiled down at her. "Hi."

Flushing just a little, she looked away and gnawed on her lower lip as she considered what this must look like. "I didn't intend for this to happen when I came here last night."

She'd meant to talk to him, and maybe they would begin again. Making love was not her intention and with a bit of shock she recalled they hadn't taken precautions. Had she completely lost her mind? What did it mean, that Booth touched her and drove reason far afield?

With a chuckle and a tap on her nose he admitted, "I did, the moment I saw you standing next to my bed."

This had surprised her, he could see. He had another one for her. "Can I tell you a secret?"

A cautious nod. Under morning sunlight Booth admired the glowing flush of her skin, the soft tumble of dark hair, the pink in her cheeks, and confessed to ulterior motives. "This is why I kept coming to your apartment early enough to wake you with coffee."

Utter confusion. "For sex?" Which didn't make sense because they'd never...

"No." He indulged himself in a caress, stroking the smooth skin he'd been denied for so long. "Ever since that night in Vegas when we had to share the hotel room, I've loved seeing you early in the morning. There's just something about how your skin glows and your eyes are soft and I don't think you realize how incredibly beautiful you look. So all those wake-up visits were to hopefully catch you looking just like this."

Vegas? Brennan counted backwards and noted with surprise, "That was two and a half years ago!"

"Yes it was." Then, gifting her with his cockiest grin, he lifted himself over her and explained, "I've waited five years for you and it hasn't always been easy. Sometimes you've driven me nearly insane." Like yesterday, he nearly snorted. God knew she'd set him spinning yesterday. His head was still spinning a little now but he chalked that up to his rapidly returning desire. Because she was there, naked underneath him and he could think of little else other than exploiting opportunity.

But she had latched onto something else entirely. "Wait. What? You ... waited five years? For me?"

Suddenly, knowing she'd been prey (of a sort) made her a little dizzy. Seeing that finely toned muscular definition up close in slanting morning light was setting fire to her autonomic nervous system. Her hypothalamus had already recognized it and tapped her adrenal glands for preparation. Increased secretions of epinephrine and norepinephrine were now dilating her pupils, the bronchioles of her lungs, and the blood vessels in her skeletal muscles; the hormones were increasing her pulse and initiating the abrupt halting of peristalsis in her stomach and intestines that caused the feeling of twisting that she'd always wondered about. 'Butterflies in the stomach' was in fact caused by the digestive system shutting down in preparation for 'fight or flight' or, in this case, making love.

She could tell by the obsidian in his eyes that he wanted to do it again so she finally had her answer: Booth had been doing this to her for five years, but most startling of all was the fact that he'd been feeling it, too.

"Five years, since the moment I saw you."

Stunned, she watched him watching her as her mouth dried out and her thundering heart could surely be heard by his neighbors. Five years?! Who does that?

Seeing the disbelief be overswept by arousal and a trace of fear, he moved his lips against her with devastating confidence. "I'm a sniper, Bones. You know what that means?"

"You're a good shot," she breathed out, nearly deaf for the roaring in her head.

"Expert sharp-shooter, but that's only a part, the smallest part." He grazed over her skin in small brushstrokes, making her gasp as he whispered to her. "We observe and gather information. We plan very carefully. We find the perfect blind. But most importantly, a sniper _waits_ ... for the perfect ... moment." The kisses took her under so swiftly she could barely breathe and already the nuclear force was taking over as her body sang for his. "We wait for as long as it takes; we don't move, we don't give up. A sniper has to be patient, you see. And Bones..."

A rare instance where she was incapable of speech. Besides, vertigo always seems worse when experienced laying down and what he was telling her made her head spin and her heart expand. Booth was more goal-oriented than she'd realized.

"I've never missed a target."

~Q~

And she'd never made such an irrational, impulsive non-decision as this one. Twice in one morning, unplanned and unprotected sexual intercourse with her partner. Part of her flushed with remembered pleasure, with jagged flashes of his mouth on her, his hands, his _body_. There was a more rational part of her that shook a metaphorically exasperated finger at her utter loss of prudence and temperance.

Never before had she been so 'caught up in the moment' that she forgot all good sense and self protection.

Picking up her clothing, she turned to Booth and said worriedly, "I could conceive. We weren't careful."

"That's what you wanted."

Nervously, she put on her camisole and used the activity to avoid his eyes. "Yes, but you..." And she didn't finish, didn't know what she was most afraid to hear.

"Bones."

When he said her name like that she had to meet him half way. Booth turned her face towards his and he was smiling at her. "I wanted to make love to you and I want to have a baby with you and make a family with you. It's maybe a little rushed, but if it happens, then it's meant to be."

"Meant to be...?"

"Fate."

She rolled her eyes. Probably that was wrong to dismiss his beliefs in the untestable unknown but she just couldn't help it. Booth grinned and kissed the tip of her nose. "If you're having a baby then I'm damn well going to ensure that it's mine."

Annoyed, she pushed him back and slipped her blouse on. "Don't get all alpha male on me. My reproductive organs do not belong to you."

He pulled her against him and kissed her, proving his claim over her had merit. "No other man is getting near you again so the result is the same."

They were almost late for work.

~Q~

She knew something was wrong when he stiffened beside her and sent a startled glance towards the empty seat across the table. Booth's brow furrowed and a sort of dismay tinged his faintly spoken response, "Oh God," as if someone he didn't expect or want to see had just taken a seat.

Perhaps he had suddenly remembered something. Brennan glanced from Booth to the chair, puzzled. "Booth, what is it?"

Booth assured the chair, "Some people, they just feel remorse and they want to set the record straight." And a moment later, "Nobody asked you."

"Booth, who are you talking to?"

"What's going on," their suspect Dunwood demanded.

Sensing at last her confusion, Booth seemed to collect himself and gestured that he was fine. "Nothing. Just … go on."

Dunwood's explanation continued, but before he got more than another sentence out, Booth turned to fiercely hiss, "Will you shut up! Shut up!"

This is wrong, right? Brennan tried frantically to recall if Booth had ever played insanity while interrogating but could not think of a single example. This was wrong, something…. "Booth, _who_ are you talking to!"

He didn't hear her at all. Whatever had his attention was sitting in the empty chair, making him shake his head. "I didn't say that. … No, no, I'm—I can't walk away! I never said that, okay? Do you understand? _I can't walk away._ This is my kid. If I can't be involved, I don't want her to have the _baby_."

Dunwood was openly gaping. "What the hell's going on here?"

Fiercely, Brennan barked, "_You_ shut up and don't move. Booth, you're coming with me." She dragged him out of his chair, panic snarling against the back of her skull as implications spun. He was talking to an empty chair, talking about the baby they might be having. What was going on? What...?!

What was he seeing?

And why was he talking about the baby like they hadn't already worked it out? It was like he'd forgotten what happened this morning. Oh god, oh god….

He stumbled a little as a foot caught on the chair but once out in the hall, the door to interrogation room 2 slammed shut, Booth seemed fine if not a bit frazzled. He ran his hand over his head and face and she shoved her panic into a dark, deep hole so she could talk to him.

"Hey, what is going on?" Brennan asked quietly so she wouldn't spook him.

"I can't do it. Listen, I have to be involved."

They had decided that. They'd decided that already. Last night. This morning. They'd… She shut the escaping panic back down, trying to grasp what was happening. Fact, he'd spoken to thin air. Fact, he was acting like this was still yesterday, like he couldn't remember what had happened only hours ago.

"If I'm the father then, I have to _be_ the father."

No, not now. Deliberately setting her focus on gathering evidence, Brennan asked concisely, "you were seeing something in there. What were you seeing?"

And Booth shrugged. "Stewie. The baby from the Family Guy."

That was a television program, wasn't it? Booth watched it sometimes. Another leap of horror tore at her innards, at the casual way he dismissed what he saw which was clearly a hallucination. He'd taken a seat and looked relieved to finally have the burden of sperm donation taken off his chest.

"You … You saw Stewie, in there? In the interrogation room?" Hallucinations, what causes them? Her mind flew over physiology, pulling out probable causes rapidly so she could begin to take corrective steps. Gather a baseline, then seek immediate medical attention to avoid permanent damage.

"So, what do you say about the kid?" Booth asked instead.

It didn't matter that she might already be pregnant unless she rushed to take a morning after pill. Nothing else mattered but getting him to a hospital. Clearly, to achieve that brain-saving goal she had to get him off the topic of her potential pregnancy. "Fine. I won't have a baby."

He was shocked at the lack of an argument. "Fine? That's it?"

Frantically, she tugged his arm to lift him. "No, it doesn't matter now. We're going to the hospital."

He jerked away, combative suddenly. "It's no big deal, okay?"

"No, it _is_." Hallucination and sudden memory loss. Now altered mood. Could be a stroke, could be a small aneurysm, could be a subdural hematoma, could be a chemical imbalance, could be so many things. "Trust me, something is _wrong_. Trust me!"

The pitch of her distress must have reached him.

Through the shifts in personality and perceptions he was still Booth, who trusted Brennan with his life. He let her call 911 and he let her go with him to the nearest emergency department at George Washington University Hospital, where they learned what had gone so terribly wrong. And through the blizzard of medical terms and forms to sign, through rapid preparations for emergency surgery, he clung to what he knew still: that Brennan was his strength and his partner. She would watch over him, as she always did, so he asked her to watch over him now.

"I'm not a neurologist, or a surgeon," she protested.

"You're a genius, that's good enough for me."

What else could she do but agree when he was trying so hard not to be scared?

As he was being taken in for emergency surgery, Booth halted to tell her his deepest wish, the one he still remembered. "If I don't make it, I want you to have my stuff. You're going to be a great mom."

"You're going to be fine, Booth." Hadn't she wished that a year ago?

When the anesthetics caused neuroshock and near total collapse, Brennan watch him nearly die again and it was no less horrifying than the first time. Her heart was torn from her body and lay sleeping in the man who had slipped away into a coma. For four days she waited and hoped (and completely forgot to take that morning after pill), and she wrote.

_"You see two people and you think, 'They belong together. They love one another.' But nothing happens. Perhaps it's because, for some people, the thought of losing so much control over personal happiness is unbearable. If something, anything, happened to that other person, it would be death. If they left you, it would be death…. Yet the truth is, some burdens are not burdens at all. Like wings, they have weight. We feel that weight on our backs, but they are a burden that lifts us, burdens that allow us to fly." *_

Finally, finally... his eyes opened.

And she rushed to him, overjoyed to feel life again. "Booth, you're awake! What took you so long to wake up?"

But he looked confused as his eyes traveled over her face. "Who are you...?"

~Q~

* * *

*This quote is taken from page 127 in the Bones episode guide, The Forensics Files, by Paul Ruditis (Titan Books, October 2009). He features quotes from each episode that I presume were lifted directly from the script. This particular quote reveals quite a lot more than the excerpt that aired.

Medical Correction: Those Bones writers count on the audience not knowing things like ... the definition of cerebellar. The cerebellum controls movement; therefore a tumor located there would cause problems with balance, walking, writing, etc; NOT hallucinations. Because Booth later specifically has amnesia (Sweets says so in Harbingers, and there are many hints dropped throughout early season 5 that Booth has forgotten things and changed preferences) and because of the sudden alteration of consciousness in the interrogation room, Booth in my story is probably suffering from an aneurysm or small subdural bleed caused by that blow to his head in Fire in the Ice. It's more accurate, medically, than a tumor that hits children 85% of the time and is in the wrong region of the brain for any of these symptoms. Furthermore, bleeding would probably be treated by emergency surgery, but a slow-growing, non-malignant tumor would not.

Author's Note: I don't always make these things up. The rock-paper-scissors exchange between Cam and Angela happened in season four, The Beaver in the Otter. Cam is the one who said the bones speak to Brennan. See? Not making this up, folks. That there is a canon moment. :D

So... Is this romance really AU? Here's what I noticed: Brennan's musings (that Hodgins narrates) at the beginning of that key scene in The End in the Beginning may be about how _her_ life has recently changed. The clock reads 4:47 but switches format to 05:43 when the 'dream' begins. But that's not the strongest evidence. This is:

I've read multiple interviews and spoilers from this era (especially Hart Hanson & Stephen Nathan, but also one from Emily Deschanel herself, whom I trust the most as a source!) and they all said the same thing: "The sex is real. It's not a dream; it's not a hallucination." All of them said it on record in early 2009. And based on the clock evidence, it's not part of Brennan's book/Booth's dream.

So...

Is this really AU or is there a possibility that it really happened? What do you readers think?


	35. Starting Over

Author's Note: If this were a roller coaster, we'd have reached the top, the point where potential energy transfers into kinetic energy. But don't worry, you already saw the end at the beginning, and Avalon called it. "It all works out eventually."

Avalon's actual Tarot reading from Harbingers in a Fountain is interpreted in this story, as accurately as Brennan can manage it. If there's an error, blame her. :P

* * *

~Q~

~Starting Over~

~Q~

**Our revels now are ended. These our actors,**  
**As I foretold you, were all spirits, and**  
**Are melted into air, into thin air:**  
**And like the baseless fabric of this vision,**  
**The cloud-capp'd tow'rs, the gorgeous palaces,**  
**The solemn temples, the great globe itself,**  
**Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,**  
**And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,**  
**Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff**  
**As dreams are made on; and our little life**  
**Is rounded with a sleep.**

_The Tempest, Act IV, Scene 1, Lines 148-158_

~Q~

History repeating itself was a theme she'd been considering endlessly since the moment she left. Four years ago, almost to the day, her relationship with a man had crashed and sent her careening to Guatemala. Four years ago she'd returned to DC via Dulles to find Angela waiting for her.

Today she walked off the plane feeling just as frayed and grimy from travel, just as tired, just as wary about what she would find when she began to pick up the pieces of her life.

Angela waved to her from across the baggage claim area, grinning broadly. Brennan mustered a warm smile in return, dragging her bags behind as she found herself swept up into an enthusiastic embrace of effusive greeting. At least this one thing hadn't changed. Her best friend chattered non-stop the entire length of the concourse, just like four years ago. Brennan smirked at this familiar scenario, but found herself darting cautious little glances behind her in search of a Homeland Security tail. Here was where the present finally departed from the past: no one was following her because Special Agent Seeley Booth wasn't up to staging any false rescues today.

"How's Booth?" Brennan finally asked.

History repeated itself with him: they got close and he nearly died. Twice now.

"Well he's fine, pretty much."

"Pretty much?"

Angela paused and answered carefully, clearly uncertain how to describe his current state of mind. "He's still got a few memory glitches."

Weakly, Brennan asked, "How bad?"

"Not as bad as when you left," Angela promised. "He's been asking about you."

"Who I am?" Brennan braced herself for confirmation.

"No, where are you and when are you getting back. He's missed you."

That just made tears sting so Brennan glanced away and gratefully accepted the distraction of loading her bag into Angela's car. When her friend spoke again, it took her by surprise. "I want you to meet someone."

"Who?" Six weeks of painful isolation in the jungles had roughened her edges again. Brennan felt her old, prickly self peeking through the fractured pieces of who she had become since making the bargain with Angela three years ago. Three years to learn how to interact with others, and yet six weeks with the discontented dead had scraped off the layers of social convention and rules of polite discourse just enough that she spoke bluntly.

"My friend, Avalon," Angela explained.

The name was faintly familiar, and it took Brennan several minutes to pluck it out of the past. She recalled Booth's eyes matching hers and his agreement. _"I do believe in Temperance. And everything it implies."_

Biting her lip (worried Brennan would bite off her head, perhaps?), Angela turned and confessed her trespass. "I told her about you and Booth and she's asked to see you. She says she has an urgent message for you."

With a resigned grunt, Brennan gave up and pouted. Sometimes it was just better to let Angela have her way, so Brennan said nothing more when Angela turned their car towards the park where she'd arranged to meet the woman. While they drove, Brennan reviewed again the contrasts between this return and the one from four years ago. Last time she was diverted by an arrest; this time by an impromptu visit to a psychic.

They met under a locust tree, beneath which the psychic had taken up residence at a relatively clean picnic table covered in midnight velvet. Avalon Harmonia was pallid, her voice oddly musical and her hands always busy with the cards. She shuffled and toyed with them while she waited but when she heard their approach Avalon stilled and gifted them with a generous lifting of lips.

"You must be Temperance."

A logical conclusion if Angela had already arranged this. Brennan reluctantly took the proffered hand and shook it before unceremoniously plopping herself down on a bench at the table. Would it be rude to demand they just get this over with? Probably.

Angela took a seat as well and smiled broadly when Avalon passed her deck of Tarot cards to Brennan with an implied request to shuffle them. She acquiesced (the better to finish quickly), and when Avalon had them back in her possession she revealed the first drawn card with a quick flash of presentation.

Already squirming like an excited child, Angela exclaimed, "Temperance! The first card she turns over is literally your name."

There was a 1 in 78 chance of that happening, Brennan clipped out coolly. Didn't mean a thing and she wouldn't be swayed by a name. Not even her own name that she hated. The only name she wanted now was "Bones" and for the last six weeks she'd gone without hearing it. She wasn't sure if he would ever call her that again.

Yet there was a curious artifact of her genius, which was having a memory that couldn't lose a single detail no matter how much she later wished it would. The problem was, Brennan knew what that damn card meant. She'd known since the day Angela told her about Temperance and Death and Justice, the triptych that convinced her to stay at the Jeffersonian. Ever curious, Brennan had looked the cards up and didn't stop at those three. So she knew them all, every card Avalon pulled and set down.

_Temperance_ represents unity and partnership.

"It's not really speaking to me," Avalon mused thoughtfully.

The next card was the _Nine of Swords_: Nightmares. Worry.

Her partner nearly dying in front of her helpless eyes as the doctors scrambled themselves into frantic activity. Comatose, GCS 5. His dream and her four days of worried vigil.

Avalon might have been a fraud and informed by Angela, but she'd also done her homework. She looked up at Brennan with a piercing gaze and spoke. "I see a sick man in a hospital."

Another card, the _Two of Cups_: Love, understanding, balanced partnership. The start of a trusted relationship. Brennan swallowed an irrational urge to believe and glanced away.

Not taking avoidance as an answer, Avalon spoke again, detailing that painful history that had dominated her life for four harrowing days. "He takes refuge in a dream life. You're there, in the dream, and you're helping him to create that dream life by telling him a story."

_"Who are you?"_

"You're both so happy in the story, so happy it's almost sad when he awakens."

Another card, the _Ten of Pentacles_: Success, completion, prosperity. A loving relationship.

'Almost sad?' No. Absolute devastation. That's what it was.

~Q~

_He'd looked up at her with hazy, blank eyes. "Who are you?"_

_"I— I'm Bones."_

_His eyes moved past her, dismissing her as he searched the room. "Bren?"_

_"No." Confused, she backed up and tried to suppress a sense of impending loss because this was turning into an entirely different nightmare. He was wandering aimlessly, looking for someone who didn't exist and growing agitated when he couldn't find her._

_"Where's Bren?"_

_Pleading, terrified. "Booth, don't you know me?"_

_"Where's my wife!"_

_Brennan backed up another step. "I'll get the doctor."_

~Q~

Trying to shut off those bitter memories, the ones she'd been concealing for weeks now, Brennan told Angela she was tired and wanted to go home to shower.

Avalon flipped over another card: _The Lovers_. A decision involving moral values. _"Please, let's just do this the right way."_

Lovers.

_"Do you love me?"_

_"Do you want me to prove it to you?"_

On impulse, Brennan pressed her palms flat against the table. This was how a person prepared to push themselves up and away, which was precisely what she wanted to do. Up, and away because it hurt and she wanted to forget it all as completely as he had.

Avalon's voice reached her through her confusion. "The man whose life you saved is really excited to see you again."

Deny everything. Just get away. "No, I don't save lives. People are already dead when I get to them."

Oh, a tough nut was this Temperance. Exasperated, Avalon insisted, "I'm pretty sure you saved somebody's life."

Another card. _Strength_: Courage, a time to overcome one's fears.

"A man with the heart of a lion. … This man was lost. You brought him the light that showed him the way home. Without it, he would have died."

This was too much of a metaphor for her to cope with when she was so tired and so lost herself. Angela was speaking, telling Avalon that Brennan was reading her book to Booth and he woke up believing he and Brennan were married. But that wasn't quite it; she'd blamed the novel she was working on because she had no better way to explain why Booth thought he was married and making love to 'Bren' and yet he didn't recognize his partner of four years. He didn't remember Bones...

Avalon held her gaze with hypnotic intensity. "You were joined at that time."

What time, the time before? No one knew, Brennan reminded herself. No one knew they'd made love but Booth, and he'd … forgotten. Her heart thrashed inside its cage, waiting for the psychic to speak again.

"You're still joined," Avalon said.

Angela didn't know, which meant Avalon couldn't know. It was a guess. It was fraud. It was impossible.

Knowing she couldn't possibly deal with anything more, Brennan muttered that none of this made any sense. She had to get away.

As she stood to make her escape, Avalon turned over one last card (_Ten of Cups_: family, commitment, an outward proof of love. Having a baby together.) and looked sharply at Brennan. "Were you pregnant?"

Vertigo swept through her, wrenching pain of loss, so many things she'd lost. The laugh sounded brittle even to her own ears. She denied it, and saw Angela's eyes go wide. There had been talk of course because she'd announced it, that she intended to use Booth's donated sperm.

Booth had suggested they do it the right way, and that one morning together they hadn't exactly made any effort to prevent it. Then the hallucination and memory gap, the rush to Emergency, surgery, collapse, coma ... four days of waiting. Two days of not being remembered so she'd fled to a dig. By the time she'd remembered the risk, Brennan was entrenched in the remote jungles of Guatemala, a place where early pregnancy tests weren't readily available. She slogged through two more nerve-wrecking weeks of waiting and as the time stretched and the likelihood increased, Brennan accepted the fact that she was being subjected to the natural consequence of unprotected sex. She decided she would simply say she'd used his donated sperm when the inevitable questions arose.

Sometimes fate has other ideas, however. Just as Brennan had resigned herself to the reality and was working through the exhilarating terror of pregnancy, proof arrived in the fourth week that the only thing certain in her world was loss. There would be no baby. The mix of mild relief (that she wouldn't have to lie about her baby's origin) and crushing disappointment had only confused her further. The bones surrounding her had never spoken so clearly before, making her work in Guatemala nearly effortless.

All of this swept through her mind in an instant and she worried that Angela's psychic had somehow read her mind.

But Avalon only tilted her head curiously. "I mean in your book."

Brennan froze, shocked once more because as eerily accurate as Avalon had been all through the reading, here she was wrong. Brennan's book featured a married couple where the wife announced a pregnancy at the end, but Avalon had asked "were _you_ pregnant." Semantics.

"No, I deleted the book." And she fled, leaving Angela to sit there with the Tarot layout that spelled the recent rise and fall of her fortunes.

Angela sighed and assured the psychic, "Underneath the icy exterior beats a very warm heart."

Avalon gazed after Brennan with concern. "Her life is at a very critical turning point between great happiness, and..." She flipped over the final card: _Death_... (Brennan would have known this meant Change. The end of an era.)

~Q~

Even as an expert on the subject, Brennan had never encountered this kind of loss before: an emotional Schrodinger's Cat. Booth was there and yet not there. Physically, he'd recovered although she still detected a faint slurring of consonants and a slight tremor when he walked. He was affable and earnest, almost softer than he'd been before. He looked at her with a yearning that suggested affection, yet the holes in his memory drove holes in her heart as each new gap was exposed.

Black neck tie and plain socks, FBI regulation. The last time she'd seen him wear that was their first case together.

No Cocky belt buckle plus Booth saying he didn't know why it had ever appealed to him. (She'd given the last one to him, but he didn't remember the first one had made its appearance when she was dating Sully.)

He came to her at dawn but didn't ask for breakfast. Ever since her father's trial they'd almost always had breakfast together, but he didn't remember. Instead he almost literally ran away when she suggested it. As he vanished over the rim above Brennan cried at the bottom of a mass grave, alone with the burden of memories she couldn't stand to keep yet couldn't bear to lose.

And yet when she went alone to ask Dr. Leacock if his Harbingers patients may have been poisoned, caught by surprise when he tried to stab her, fighting him off with a slice to her left shoulder and then a stabbing defense wound to her lower right forearm and Dr. Leacock had gained the advantage despite his excessive weight because he'd utilized the element of surprise quite effectively and as Brennan's panicked thoughts flashed to desperate measures that might not work, the door behind her burst open with a crash! and a flurry of black and a bang! and Leacock fell because Booth remembered her.

Brennan gasped, picking herself up, half dazed, her senses scrambled as she felt almost nothing but saw her assailant shot dead (unexpected, so unexpected, she shouldn't have come alone but she was always alone these last weeks) and Booth dropping behind her.

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm okay." She was running on adrenaline, running on fear and stress. And Booth, where did he come from? How did he know? He was putting his arms around her, pulling her back against his chest like he would have done in the past.

"Bones, your arm!"

Wet dripping, burning sting, a scalpel standing out of her flesh (flexor carpi ulnaris muscle, median basilic vein?). Brennan's eyes widened. "Oh, God." _Get it out! Get it out!_ The same mistake she'd admonished the Beaver for but sometimes reason takes a back seat to instinct. Gasping, she curled the fingers of her left hand around the handle and pulled.

Some things he did not forget, and this was one thing drilled into him from the military, from the biannual first aid re-certifications the FBI made him go through: an impaled object must remain in place. He tried to warn her. "Don't pull it out, don't touch it!"

But it was too late, she'd pulled and blood spurted out of the wound, but it was not dark venous blood. Brennan started to panic, realizing she might have an arterial bleed (ulnar artery, close to the surface of the posterior forearm), her own blood she couldn't stop it now but his strong hand clamped tightly over the wound.

"Bones, easy!" He squeezed. Held her together.

"He tried to kill me."

"Easy, I got you!" he soothed. "I've got you."

"Thank you," Brennan whispered, relieved to let him be in control because she was scared on so many levels and had been the strong one for both of them during those dark days and she was carrying the secret that distracted her and she couldn't do things alone anymore. She couldn't even defend herself.

"The ambulance is on the way," he promised.

Faintly, she pleaded, "Keep pressure on the wound." What was she thinking, to pull it out? She was thinking that Booth was there, that it meant everything and nothing to have him holding her.

"I got it. Just relax. Just trust me, all right?"

She started to cry then. Trust him. Impossible promises that he made, and forgot, and made again. Brennan turned her face into his chest, muffling her sobs against his clean white shirt and feeling his heart pound out his own fear, for her. This was fate, that he forgot and yet somehow still remembered what they were to each other.

"I'll take care of you, all right? I've got you, I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere. I've got you, Baby."

All those promises. All those promises that he couldn't keep and she cried into his shirt over what she'd lost and he didn't even know. He thought it was because she'd been stabbed in the arm. He didn't know it was because of the unhealed wounds that fate had dealt her.

~Q~

From the moment he'd opened his eyes to her face, Seeley Booth had felt strange surges of confusion. She wasn't 'Bren,' but those worried silver eyes, filling with pain and tears, told him something was wrong. He just didn't know what, didn't know who she was or why she was crying. Before he could get any sense of who she might be, she'd fled. It was two days later before he saw her again.

By this time, he'd been informed that the woman with him when he woke was Dr. Temperance Brennan, his civilian partner who helped him investigate murders for the FBI. And Brennan sounded a lot like 'Bren' so everyone concluded Booth had dreamed of her. He wasn't married, there was no nightclub and no baby, only this woman who seemed familiar and obviously cared about him.

"You're my partner?" he asked warily.

"We've worked together for four years. You don't remember?" Her eyes were guarded now, the tears tucked away.

It was all a spotted, mixed up mess in his head. Flashes of her face mixed with memories from the dream: making love, talking about having a baby. But that wouldn't happen with a work partner. He let his head roll to the side as his weak (but not dead) body reacted to memories of her that probably weren't true. "I want to remember. It's hard."

Talking was hard. His head throbbed.

Dr. Brennan reached out a tentative hand and stroked his arm tenderly. It felt tender to him, but he was looking for something that didn't exist. Maybe it was only sympathy; he probably looked as confused as he felt. "Dr. Jursic assures me you will improve rapidly now that you're awake. Your memory will return."

"Yeah. Yeah, I'll be fine. You know, some therapy and stuff."

Biting her lip, Brennan withdrew her hand and took her turn avoiding his eyes. "Since you aren't able to work in the field, I've decided to take up an invitation to help a colleague of mine, Dr. Arthur Demarest. He needs someone to determine cause of death of over 50 people he's found buried in a grouping of cisterns at Cancuen. They were buried there with all of their belongings, possibly as part of a ritual conquest in 800 CE."

None of it made sense. Booth groaned a little. "What?"

"Cancuen was a Mayan city in Guatemala," Brennan said softly. "I'm a forensic anthropologist. I work with bones, human skeletal remains. They ... they told you that, right?"

"Yeah. You're Dr. Brennan." He flinched a little at the way she said bones, sensing it was something important but he still wasn't sure what it meant. All he'd managed to grasp was that she was a scientist who worked with him, and she looked familiar and he saw pain flicker in her glowing eyes when he said her name.

"I'll be back in six weeks," she promised. And then she left, because she was just an FBI consultant to him. There was no reason to stay.

It took another week for him to learn why she'd looked so lost that last day. The nearly too young psychologist, Dr. Sweets, showed Booth a newspaper clipping from a few months ago. He saw himself with her, sitting on a bench drinking cups of coffee and laughing, their eyes connected. The people in that picture looked like ... he didn't know. Friends? Close.

He wished he could remember.

"That is you and Dr. Brennan. You call her Bones." That explained why what she'd told him had resonated. _"I work with bones."_ Sweets pointed to the headline. "You've been partners for four years; you have an excellent case clearance rate. You're very close."

"How close?" Booth asked, feeling again a stirring of some familiar affection when he looked at her, at the photo of her.

"Best friends," Sweets replied.

"That's all?" It felt like more, it felt like love but that was only the dream. He was mixing her up with the dream.

Cautiously, the younger man nodded. "That's all that I'm aware of."

"Are you sure I'm not married to her?"

~Q~

By the time she came back from Guatemala Booth's memories had mostly returned but with holes and gaps that he discovered only when people around him pointed them out. Brennan's surprise at nearly sitting on him where he was waiting for her in her office immediately transformed into joy as he exclaimed, "Bones!" and she launched herself at him in a delighted embrace. The way she felt in his arms launched memories of embraces past and a torrid coupling in his bedroom during the early morning hours.

There was a contradiction between what he remembered of her (pieced together by stories from the people who knew them both, his careful review of many of their case files, even some 'partners therapy' notes Sweets had provided), and what he felt when he was with her. His brain said partner, his heart said wife. His doctors said dream; and Brennan said nothing.

Just as Booth was becoming convinced his feelings were real (even if he still could not explain how or why he felt this was true), Sweets came around to show him PET scans. He insisted Booth had fallen in love with her in a dream while unconscious, and that the feelings would fade away. So science and Sweets said it was false but that didn't make sense because his friend Cam had given him a warm grin and assured him outright, "You're in love with Doctor Brennan."

She _knew_ him; she was his oldest friend (he could _remember_ this as a fact that was never in dispute) and that meant she was a reliable source of information.

By this point he was getting rather desperate so he even asked the psychic. Avalon told him to let science have his brain because they didn't know anything about his heart, so he decided to take the risk of trusting his feelings and his oldest friend. As he walked Brennan towards the Diner only a couple of days after her return he began his confession. "Ever since my coma there's something I've been wanting to say to you, about you, from inside my heart."

"Blood is in your heart," Brennan corrected nervously.

He was sure, so sure now that he could trust his feelings and he was gathering his thoughts when a clown appeared in front of him. Water splashed in his face, soaking him and making him laugh. Booth tweaked the red nose, still amused, until he heard Brennan warning him not to shoot. Brennan's baffled reaction at his incorrect response made him question everything. (Because he wasn't supposed to think clowns were funny. He wasn't supposed to change his mind about certain, fundamental truths.)

"What did you want to tell me?" she asked as the clown wandered away with his confidence.

Well now that he'd started Booth knew he had to say something. "That I love you."

Brennan halted like stone. Her eyes widened. Dark things flickered behind her eyes, fears and doubts that terrified him into stuttering, "in a professional, atta-girl kind of way." There was so much more in there, truths hidden inside his mysterious partner that he would never know.

The only thing he knew for certain was that he couldn't believe it was genuine when she laughed weakly and awkwardly punched his shoulder. "Right back at'cha, Booth. I love you too. Atta-boy."

He worried it meant she didn't love him at all.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: This is the amazing thing about a Hart Hanson script. There is symbolism in small things, like the fact that Brennan is coming back from Guatemala. She's starting over. Like that scene where Brennan was stabbed and Booth is reacting like they're close yet doesn't seem to understand his own feelings, and the fact that Brennan is _far_ more shaken and upset than she normally would be. And why does she go to see Avalon? Could it be because deep down, she knows Avalon is genuine and she's looking for any reassurance she can find that Booth will eventually remember...?


	36. The Push in the Partnership

Author's Note: The good news is, you know how it's going to end. The bad news is, we're not there yet. Before we can get there, Booth and Brennan have to take some risks and make some adjustments.

* * *

~Q~

~The Push in the Partnership~

~Q~

**O fortune, fortune! all men call thee fickle:**  
** If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him**  
** That is renown'd for faith? Be fickle, fortune; **  
** For then, I hope, thou wilt not keep him long, **  
** But send him back.**

_Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene 5, Lines 59-63_

~Q~

Sometimes she wondered if she had developed an obsessive compulsive disorder where her partner was concerned. Brennan tracked every detail of Booth's lapses and recovery, noting with increasing dismay all the ways large and little that he'd changed. He led with a different foot, drank from a different hand, held his phone to a different ear. He laughed at a clown. These were the little things.

The larger things (unable to fix plumbing and cars, forgetting how to spot lies in a suspect) worried her greatly. Of course the biggest lapse of all, forgetting _her_, no one even realized had happened. Going to Sweets felt almost like a betrayal but she couldn't contain her worry any longer.

"He's not getting any better," she blurted out. Standing uncomfortably behind the chair where normally she would be seated beside Booth, Brennan curled her fingers over the nubbly upholstered backrest and willed psychology to be of use for once.

Sweets matched her concern with a solemn expression that she read as caution. "He's improved in both memory and coordination a great deal in the last two months."

"He doesn't know what he likes, he can't tell if people are lying. He's changed dominance in his hand and foot!"

"That's been documented in people who have suffered amnesia as a result of brain trauma, as well as changing preferences. This is normal, Doctor Brennan."

She knew it, intellectually. Having conducted her own frantic research over the last weeks, Brennan knew amnesia could pervade many areas of a person's life and completely alter their personalities as well as their preferences. There were subtle changes she was sensing that that infused her with despair: Booth was impatient now, and more likely to lose his temper over small frustrations. An urge to shed lachrymal fluid involuntarily squeezed her nose like pinching fingers. She blinked, resisting the emotional reflex but she couldn't help saying, "He's not the same."

To his credit, Sweets tried to reassure her without psychology. "In all the ways that matter, he is the same man."

She whispered it, what she felt. "No, he's not." It wasn't just that he didn't remember her, there was something different, something missing.

"Okay, well, I admit he's not as confident as he used to be," Sweets finally conceded. "But that's to be expected."

Was that all it was? Brennan nodded, trying to satisfy herself with the fact that Booth was definitely lacking the almost cocky assurance that had floated him through each day. Deep in her own untapped reservoir of emotional instincts, however, she sensed it was more than confidence that was lost. It was a fundamental belief that had vanished.

~Q~

"You know, I don't think I can handle her scoping me out like I'm a piece of meat. Why don't you two tag team her?" Booth suggested. "I'll just wait out here."

"Booth?" Brennan turned to him in confusion as her partner slumped into a seat outside the bullpen, clearly intending to not even observe the interrogation.

"I'm quite certain young Doctor Sweets here can manage on his own," Wyatt demurred. "Doctor Brennan and I shall observe the proceedings together, if that's acceptable?"

A significant glance between the elder and the younger psychologist went unnoticed by Booth, but not by Brennan. She glanced uneasily at Booth again as she felt his affectionate gaze roving over her. She had begun to sense that Booth thought he was in love with her and yet he seemed to have no foundation for it. He believed the feeling was new and transplanted rather than old and slow growing, a young and delicate hothouse-grown flower rather than a wild and strong old growth tree that had suffered damage at its core but still stood stately and strong. She could climb into a tree and rest in its branches, but a hothouse flower is easily crushed underfoot. So she couldn't encourage him, no matter how desperately her heart yearned to just give in again.

There was also the question of disaster, which always followed in the footsteps of them getting too close. (Literally, 'bad star' was what disaster meant, a bad portent or omen that spelled destruction and doom for those who didn't heed the warning.) That last two times she'd tried an intimate relationship with him, Booth had nearly died shortly afterwards. The pattern was clear, the warning was evident, and she wouldn't take the risk of tempting fate a third time. Brennan tore her gaze away from Booth, nodding agreement at the sudden change in plans as Wyatt gestured her into the observation room.

The fact that former Dr. Gordon Wyatt (currently Chef G Wyatt) had asked Brennan to accompany him into the observation booth while Sweets questioned Gidget alone, was not lost on her. Disdaining psychology did not mean she was immune to its application or the ways in which one of its (former) practitioners might seize an opportunity right under an oblivious patient's nose. Booth had begged off on yet another interview, which he'd been doing frequently since the day he'd missed a lie.

The sick feeling that never seemed to go away must have shown on her face when Booth claimed he wanted to avoid Gidget's predatory persona. Brennan knew Booth's confidence had taken a hit, knew he was worried that he'd lost too much of himself after the coma. (She worried too, but tried at every opportunity to bolster him up, to reassure, because it was literally painful to her when he questioned himself. It made her ache.)

So when Gordon turned away from Gidget's outrageous proposal to Sweets that they should 'make out' because people watching turned her on, Brennan sensed a question was coming. Always smoother than Sweets could ever dream of being, Wyatt began with an acerbic observation. "This … this _persona_ that she's projecting, this 'little person cougar,' she's either masking emotional pain or overcompensating for guilt."

Puzzled by that beginning, Brennan suggested doubtfully, "Maybe you should tell Sweets." Notably, however, she had refrained from her usual forward frontal assault on the psychological arts.

"Oh, believe me," Wyatt chuckled, "if a chef could figure it out then a prodigy like Sweets would have got there long before." The vote of confidence might help further smooth the way for Brennan to accept Sweets's help with Booth, but more importantly, Wyatt now knew Brennan was worried enough to delve into psychology if it would help her partner. That spoke volumes, really.

The fact that she'd been going to Sweets all along with her worries, spoke volumes more.

Turning down the sound, Wyatt asked almost casually, "Tell me. What's _your_ theory on why Agent Booth can no longer shoot straight."

It's a physical skill, employing the pyramidal tracts of the cerebellum and hand-eye coordination, as well as the visual cortex in the occipital lobe of the cerebrum. None of those areas had been damaged during the surgery, and if he could hit a moving target at 2000 meters before, she saw no reason why he couldn't hit a stationary target in the quiet confines of Quantico's shooting range. The skill was already there and if he would continue to hone it over and over, it would help him reinforce the already existing neural pathways. He would improve, which in turn would increase his confidence and in a feedback loop, Brennan expected the boost in self esteem would help him improve even further.

Briskly, she asserted, "he should practice more," because Wyatt surely knew as much about it as she did.

This was fascinating, Wyatt mused. Brennan did not doubt Booth's ability to properly aim his weapon, only his confidence, which she thought could best be helped with additional experience. Yes, fascinating in what such a simple statement revealed.

Wyatt ventured further, testing his own hypothesis. "But perhaps, in conjunction with his using the wrong foot to climb stairs and his wrong hand to drink coffee, he's closing the wrong eye when he aims." As suspected, dismay and guilt flooded her features as she realized Sweets had shared her confidences with him, but the explanation he'd proffered she quickly dismissed.

"Real marksmen keep their eyes open when they shoot."

Fascinating…. Wyatt mused on that kind of intimacy, the way Brennan knew her partner's physical movements and the exact nature of his skills so well. The keen observational habits of a physical scientist coupled with devotion—of course she would notice and catalog even the most minute changes in his abilities. He shrugged off his lapse with a slight chuckle. "Oh. Well, that's what I get for using Quigley Down Under as a reference."

Her brow furrowed in confusion (what was quigley, and what was it down underneath?) but forgetting that, Brennan settled back into worry and guilt. "So, Sweets told you about the hands and the feet?"

For a moment, she was tempted to tell Wyatt everything, the urge nearly strangling her and the only thing that finally forced it back down was worry that their partnership would be ruined. They might be separated again, and Booth didn't remember anyway. Nothing good would come of such a confession but a weight lifted metaphorically. The moment passed, and Wyatt was speaking again.

"Hm, we're consulting," he admitted. Brennan glanced away, utterly distressed at the entire situation: both at discussing Booth behind his back, and at having unwittingly dragged _two_ psychologists into what amounted to private business. Booth would hate this. Quickly, he assured her, "Patient confidentiality is being maintained, and I won't tell Booth that you've been ratting him out to the FBI behind his back."

The accusation struck a sharp blow behind her scapulae. She winced and stumbled mentally, metaphorically, over the implications. Even though his statement required a response, Brennan found it curiously difficult to express herself at this. 'Ratting out' means reporting someone's behavior to an authority for the purposes of getting that someone into trouble. Or, saving them from trouble they couldn't foresee.

"Ratting out is an accurate phrase, but somehow it doesn't … seem true." Because she was not trying to get Booth into trouble, she was just worried and looking for help. That felt … right. It felt like the right thing to do, even if Booth probably wouldn't want her to do it. He would call it ratting out. She sighed in misery.

Smiling his approval, Wyatt remarked, "You've come quite a long distance since we last met, if you can now see a distinction between accuracy and the truth."

"I'm trying to help Booth. I can be objective about his brain and he can't."

Nodding, he agreed. "Sometimes you have to help people, against their wishes." He understood precisely what she was doing, precisely why. What she said a moment later only confirmed it.

Softly, she confessed, "I can't think of anything I wouldn't do to help him."

Wyatt wondered, idly, if she had any idea of the depth of emotion those simple words had revealed.

Noting his raised brow, the intense interest he'd taken in that last deep insight, Brennan recoiled and slammed the door into her heart closed. She nodded towards the interview still in progress. "Can we listen, please?"

But this insight into her led Wyatt to a more profound truth when he spoke with Booth that very evening. Booth had come again, lamenting his lost memories and skills, and Wyatt seized on the explanation that might place a solution into his hands. "Temperance Brennan. You're in love with her, you're building a world around her."

If Booth believed he was merely lovesick, that could give him just enough of a sense of control over his situation to pull himself ahead.

That's when Booth revealed the true loss, the fear that drove Temperance Brennan to what she perceived as a desperate measure. "She doesn't love me. I would _know_ if she loved me."

That was it, Wyatt understood, the terror she tried to work through alone because she _did_ love Booth, and knew that somewhere along the line _he'd_ forgotten what he knew about her. Booth, though he loved her, could no longer read his partner. And Brennan, though she loved him, knew Booth didn't know her heart any longer and had misapplied his own confidence where she was concerned. It was truly a disaster.

Gently, he advised, "May I counsel patience on this front? Hope, and patience."

(This was why he'd beggared off on psychology—the consequences of an error were vastly more upsetting when human emotions were involved, whereas no one was ever much bothered by a botched soufflé.) Brennan entering into the kitchen at this point saved him from further responsibility, though Wyatt sensed trouble on the wind even as he offered them a starting course that rather suspiciously resembled "sperm on corn smut."

~Q~

Booth had begun ranting about the insanity of marrying someone after only knowing them a month the moment she joined him in his SUV. "Jared met some girl in India and he's running off to get married."

"Where are we going," Brennan checked in before his rant could gather too much steam. She could see that he was wound up, ready to spin his wheels for the duration of their trip and she wanted to know how much time she'd have to work at soothing him.

"Northern Virginia, not too far. Only a month, Bones!"

Busying herself with the 911 notes, Brennan glanced at him cautiously. "I don't understand what you want me to say."

"I want you to agree with me that it's crazy!"

She frowned. "Why? Assuming your brother is not suffering from a disorder in brain chemistry or abnormal physiology, how is the decision to get married a symptom of improper brain functioning?"

"It just is!

An awkward shift while Brennan pondered his anger. If Booth truly thought Jared was insane he should be worried, not angry, so clearly this was a matter of disapproval rather than medical concern. "It sounds to me like Jared is making a decision on the course of his life that you don't agree with."

"Damn straight he is! One month is not long enough to really know someone, all right? You have to really _know_ each other in order to work out your differences."

"You and I have always managed to work out our differences even though we started out not knowing each other." Every relationship begins from a stance of not knowing the other person, but negotiating disagreements is a simple skill that requires only respect, patience, and a willingness to compromise. Brennan shook her head, trying to follow his logic and finding gaps that puzzled her.

"That's different," he sputtered.

"How is it different? Partners in work or marriage must resolve conflicts in order to maintain a healthy and productive relationship. The key would seem to be mutual respect and a desire to communicate, not an arbitrary length of history together."

"People getting married should know each other," he insisted.

"Arranged marriages in China and India last a lifetime, despite the fact that the bride and groom usually do not meet until the wedding ceremony or just before."

"Yeah, there's no love there."

Softly, she suggested, "Perhaps love comes in time, once they've experienced life together."

Booth clenched his jaw, refuting her romantic ideals with the facts of his brother's romance. "He claims he already loves her."

"Well, that's good, right?"

"He says he just knew, as soon as he saw her. Like magic." Booth rolled his eyes. "You can't love someone that fast."

A whirling vertigo spun her around and made the car seem to sway too much. Brennan remembered him teasing her years ago. _"Eyes meet across a crowded room, that Old Black Magic gets you in its spell...?"_ Primly, she'd refuted it even while knowing it was partially true. She'd felt that mystical tug the moment his eyes twinkled at her and he'd asked about fate. And now, the way he dismissed it was disorienting, rather like the world turning upside down.

"I thought you believed in the old black magic," she reminded him. "I thought you said people could meet 'the One' and they would just know it when it happened."

His hands tightened on the steering wheel. "That's just lust."

"Oh." His words crushed her. It actually felt like a boulder falling on her chest, painfully squeezing her until she could barely breathe. It squeezed tears out of her eyes that she blinked away.

"You don't make a lifetime commitment based on having the hots for someone." The reinterpretation of their first meeting crushed her, even though he had no idea what he was doing to her. Gone was the patient sniper who sensed his fate and committed himself to waiting five years for her. In his place was the impatient man beside her who didn't believe in love at all unless it met the criteria of his old fashioned ideals.

"Maybe people shouldn't make lifetime commitments anyway," Brennan finally acknowledged. She knew she sounded melancholy and resigned as she reminded herself that Booth was different and the part of him that she'd entrusted her heart to had vanished. She would never get that part of him back. "People change. Sometimes they change a lot."

"Exactly. He's making a mistake."

~Q~

He told her about it just as she was leaving her office, causing Brennan's pace to slow while his maintained a steady rate and they collided at the narrow door frame. To say she was surprised would not be saying enough. "You ran a background check on Jared's girlfriend?"

"Well yeah. You do things like that for people you care about."

Puzzled, she asked cautiously, "Do you do that when _I_ go out with someone?"

It would be proof that he cared and after what he'd said in the car about love at first sight being only lust she needed some reassurance. She needed him to affirm his affection (even if it was only friendly affection) but he deflected, which more or less indicated he didn't care enough to answer. She was uncertain of what they were to each other, or at least what he thought they were. It was getting so confusing that Brennan simply existed in the moment, living day to day until the second shoe dropped (metaphorically speaking).

"Look Bones, you're the one who always says not to jump to conclusions."

"But in matters of the heart—"

He cut her off, cut out the heart with a remarkably smug rebuttal. "Ah. The heart is just a muscle. See? I'm learning from you."

Using her own logic against her. She should be impressed, but this was not Booth. Not Boothy. Where was his almost dreamy romanticism? Where was his faith? Though he was ostensibly behaving rationally, Brennan was acutely aware of the loss of his own Boothy logic and in that context, Booth had tumbled into a sort of rational insanity that was disorienting.

"Anyways, this whole background check came up hinky."

There was that word again, slang upon slang. Brennan gratefully accepted the distraction if it would keep her from dwelling on how deeply uneasy she was starting to feel. "Hinky how?"

He whispered, "Four years ago, this woman was an escort. Jared's going to be crushed."

Baffled once again, Brennan could not follow his logic. "Why? I'm sure she possesses sophisticated sexual skills and if she's reformed…."

"She's just reformed? She's a reformed _escort._"

They were speaking different languages again, looking at the same evidence through different prisms. Where Brennan saw an attractive and satisfying sexual partner, Booth saw something else entirely. Something like infidelity or 'damaged goods,' both of which were archaic notions regarding female sexual purity. More of those old fashioned ideals, and no room for redemption or second chances.

"Well, maybe Jared already knows," she suggested. Given he was a recovering alcoholic and Padme a reformed escort, potentially that gave them a common link. Brennan still didn't see the problem.

"No, he doesn't know," Booth refuted confidently.

"Well, how do you know?"

"Because if he _knew_, he wouldn't be talking about getting married."

Now who was the one jumping to conclusions…? Brennan turned and walked away, so disturbed she was feeling physically ill.

~Q~

"When your gut speaks to you, do you think it could be caused by an increase in stomach acid due to anxiety?"

"Huh?"

"I … feel some anxiety."

"About what?"

"About your sudden abandonment of a belief system. Really, it's making my stomach upset."

Completely confused, he reacted as if she were on the verge of regurgitating the contents of her digestive tract rather than the stated source of her physical symptoms. "You know what? You are really … um … crack a window there, Bones. Just get some air."

She sighed, putting her head in her hand as she leaned wearily against the cool glass. She really was nauseated, shaking almost, the mixing of metaphorical and physical upset having become too much to handle. Yet a fear of actual vomiting was not why she'd mentioned this. What Brennan needed was relief from the anxiety and that could only happen if Booth came back to himself.

"You told me that my father's criminal past didn't matter, that the love between us was real and that was all that mattered. Because I believed you, my father and I have a relationship today."

More confusion, and an almost lost look in his eyes. As if he didn't remember. "Okay. I'm … glad I could help out."

"I'm anxious because I can't see any meaningful difference between my father and your brother's girlfriend." Her father had robbed banks, gone fugitive, and murdered two men. Padme had only been guilty of pleasuring men for pay, which in the grand scheme of things seemed far less morally offensive. So, what was the difference? "Can you explain that to me? It's a question of logic, so I'm just going to be quiet now while you work your way through it."

She waited with her head tilted back against the seat, breathing slowly through her nose to quell the nausea but the lump in her throat and threatened tears couldn't be helped. This was damage control, a calculated effort that would get Booth to back off of Padme's past and let Jared take the chance if he wanted to. If Booth's original hypothesis about love was correct, Jared and Padme would overcome their obstacles. And if they could, it might sustain Brennan's waning hope that she and Booth could as well.

"Are you okay, Bones?"

Weakly, not sure why it mattered when she certainly didn't, Brennan asked, "Booth? Do you still believe in fate?"

~Q~

Doctor Lance Sweets had listened to their story unfold with a sinking swirl that comes of sensing fate had gone horribly awry.

A snippet from over a year ago had uncoiled in his mind the moment Brennan informed him that the Cleo Eller case wasn't their first case together. Hodgins had said it. _"Their first case. I don't know what went down but she hit him and refused to speak to him for a year."_

Barely masking his desperation (did his thesis hold?) and his curiosity (what the hell had happened to make Hodgins compare her rage in the graveyard to an earlier moment that separated them for a year?), Sweets demanded the story from them. And they told it, their narratives weaving naturally in and out of the story in the same way they used to conduct interrogations together or evaded his own efforts to provide them with guidance in the partners therapy sessions. They were seamless, two parts of a whole, and listening to them recount this history was like listening to an elderly couple.

The way that they spoke of their own feelings and impressions:

"She was so beautiful."  
"I found his bone structure to be pleasingly masculine and proportionate."  
"Admit it. You thought I was hot."  
"Angela thought you were cute."  
"Really?"  
"But cute is juvenile. I think you are a very well developed adult male."  
"Well developed. What, like a photograph?"

Brennan recalled Booth asking her if she believed in fate, which made him look at her in a rather loving way. "I still do," he affirmed. Brennan was more guarded but under the statement of fact, Sweets heard despair. "I still don't."

Their story unfolded as all good stories do, drawing him in. Sweets marveled at the mounting attraction, admiration and tension between them, leaning forward almost eagerly when Brennan laughed and admitted, "I propositioned him for sex."

"What?!"

"He'd just fired me after plying me with a rather copious amount of alcohol."

"How did that make you feel," Sweets inquired. He watched her carefully.

Brennan's eyes shadowed just a little. "I questioned his intentions."

"So, it was a test?" Sweets again, knowing her better now, knowing she would have been trying to unravel Booth's behavior before making any decisions. Not that Brennan didn't participate in one night stands, but that she would want to be sure that's really what it was before initiating a physical relationship.

Booth rolled his eyes. "It wasn't a test. She wanted me. Bones doesn't hold back when she wants something."

Spearing him with a pointed glare, she retorted, "Who fell all over himself trying to get a cab? You wanted me just as much." Lust, what she'd feared then and Booth had confirmed it only a few weeks ago when he said love at first sight didn't exist.

Sweets quickly redirected them, sensing they were getting close to either upholding his thesis or destroying the entire foundation of it. "Did he pass the test, Doctor Brennan?"

Booth's eyes narrowed dangerously but he held still and turned to look at her.

Softly, she revealed what she'd heard, what it meant to her. "He told me he had a gambling problem but he was working on it."

So, not a one night stand. People do not divulge weaknesses and flaws to someone they never intend to see again. Shifting his focus between the two partners, Sweets saw Booth's eyes gentle at the reminder and Brennan's cast downward, as if in doubt.

"I asked him why he told me that, and he said—"

"I think this is going somewhere," Booth concluded quietly.

Their eyes met now, a question seeming to pass between them. Brennan drew a fortifying breath and finished, "He said he thought he was going to kiss me, so I kissed him."

Whoa! Sweets nearly fell out of his seat. "You kissed?!"

Back then? And she had initiated it.

"There was tongue contact," she affirmed, as if anticipating his next question. (He'd asked for that detail before, when they'd confessed to their blackmailed mistletoe kiss.)

"How long did this affair last," he sputtered.

Another shared glance conveying unspoken history. "Should we tell him?" she asked her partner.

Together they told him the rest, that she'd laughed and danced away, stealing the cab. He watched her leave, standing alone in the drenching summer rain. And the next day when he hired her back (without an explanation) was when the arguing began.

_"You got me drunk to fire me and then have sex with me."_

_"You decided not to have sex with me. … So, you're regretting that decision?"_

Listening to them carefully, he heard the echos of that long ago misunderstanding still bouncing through the story. When they tried to end the story of their first case with a confession (and later conviction) Sweets roared his protest. Because there was more to it, Hodgins had said so.

"No, no. What happened between you two?"

Reluctantly, Brennan confessed. "We started fighting."

The fight was ostensibly over evidence but it quickly turned scathing and personal. And, it turned physical.

_"Let go of me!"_

_"I will if you would just—Ow!"_

_"You are a bully! You use your badge and your gun to intimidate people!"_

_"Oh yeah, well you use your brain to make other people feel stupid."_

_"You **are** a stupid man. I hate you!"_

"You hit him?" Silence fell over the room for a second as Sweets saw the last curtain pulled away. She had hit him, lashed out like a wounded child. _"Striking Agent Booth indicated the depth of your feelings for him. It was a very passionate act."_ If Brennan thought Booth had lied to her, manipulated her, it was the same betrayal and rage that had fueled her reaction when she learned he wasn't really dead.

He'd thought it was a revelation that night they'd invited him to dinner, when Sweets had realized Booth loved her and was waiting, and Brennan loved him but had doubts. He'd thought they'd slowly grown to love each other over their long years of partnership, but this turned everything on its head. In finally getting the whole story, Sweets could see what it all meant. _She's been in love with him right from the beginning, and he doesn't realize it. All he has to do is speak up!_ So he pushed.

"You are totally messed up! I always said that you could never kiss because if you did, then the dam would break. Did the dam break?"

Brennan looked thoroughly confused.

Booth leaned towards her to whisper, "He still thinks we slept together."

"We're not in love with each other," Brennan insisted. Because that was the reality she had to maintain. That was the reality he'd awakened to and until he remembered otherwise, that was the only truth that existed.

Exasperated, Sweets tried to call their bluff. "One of you has to end this stalemate." Pointedly, he looked to Booth, the one he thought was holding back. "It's gotta be you, because you're the gambler."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Excitedly Apologetic Warning: My family is hosting an exchange student (from France!) over the next month, which is very exciting. :D However, it also means I'm not going to have as much time for writing because I'll be busy playing hostess/tour guide. I will try to keep the every Friday schedule but sometimes may end up being a few days late with updates.

Author's Appreciation: Thank you to everyone who is reading, marking this as a watch or favorite, and especially to those who review. I probably don't thank you enough, but I do appreciate everyone who goes the extra step. It means a lot to me. :)


	37. The Definition of Insanity

Author's Note: The definition of insanity is willfully plunging into the Post-100th Episode hell with this interpretation inflaming everything. If you recall, this story started as a dare (a joking dare) and Casket4mytears had a very specific set of questions that came with her retaliatory prompt. Casket, I didn't forget. ;)

* * *

~Q~

~The Definition of Insanity~

~Q~

**What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba,**  
**That he should weep for her? What would he do**  
**Had he the motive and the cue for passion**  
**That I have? He would drown the stage with tears,**  
**And cleave the general ear with horrid speech,**  
**Make mad the guilty, and appall the free,**  
**Confound the ignorant, and amaze indeed**  
**The very faculties of eyes and ears.**

_Hamlet, Act II, Scene 2, Lines 560-566_

~Q~

The trouble with psychology, Brennan reflected, was in the ways it tried to simplify complex matters of experience mediated by emotions and prior experience. She and Booth had been discussing the book Sweets wrote about them over the last twenty minutes, so deep in discussion that they found themselves wandering away from restaurants and towards the Lincoln Memorial. It seemed to be the place they went when they wanted to talk, _their_ place ever since that night after Maggie Schilling's trial.

"In his book, Sweets wrote that being abandoned by my parents made me convinced that all meaningful relationships are doomed," Brennan scoffed. The problem was not that simple, she rebelled internally. It wasn't just her parents who left or betrayed her, she had a lengthy list of contenders: mother, father, brother; lovers (Michael Stires, Tim 'Sully' Sullivan, and plenty of others); Zack, nestled into his own special category. And even Booth, twice despite it not quite being his fault on either occasion.

Still, Booth's vanishings had scarred her most deeply not because she thought a relationship with him was doomed ... quite the opposite. She knew only that her own doom was assured if he ever vanished out of her life again. And she knew that somehow his life always came under threat when he was too close to her so now Brennan had found a vague sort of relief in his forgetting.

As if in agreement with her that the book and its summations of them were spurious, Booth groused out his own complaint. "And he wrote that I got 'White Knight Syndrome' because of my physically abusive, alcoholic father."

White Knights wanted to rescue everyone, but that really wasn't accurate either, Brennan mused. Booth had mostly been haunted by his experiences in the military, by the job of hunting and killing humans from a distance. That is hardly a 'rescue,' as Booth himself would have agreed that often he was the one people needed to be rescued _from_. He'd even told her that once, just as he was about to charge in and rescue a little boy with a severed finger. That part of Booth was not featured in Sweets's book.

Repeatedly, she'd called attention to the missing part of Booth the Sniper, the patient man who lay in wait and knew his fate, but the only man Sweets seemed to see was the Gambler. None of the conclusions Sweets drew about them were fully correct, only surface impressions that showed only a shallow understanding of who either of the partners were.

"Hate psychology," she muttered, ready to push it all out of her mind. She'd been asking for help for Booth's memories, only to find that psychology was every bit as useless as she'd always assumed. Now she had the proof, striding right beside her, slowing down as they reached the bottom of the steps, slowing and preparing to prove that misinformed meddling would always result in an unfortunate outcome.

Booth had slowed, stopped, and revealed what psychology could not remedy. He was not the same man she'd given herself to. "I'm the gambler. I believe in giving this a chance."

He was not the man who was patient and sure, waiting five years for the inevitable. Booth moved closer to her, but all she heard was rattling dice, a rabid look of anticipation as the Gambler shook his fist and blew on the number and then tossed everything into the air to see how it would land. "Look, I wanna give this a shot."

No certainty. None.

She was dazed for just a moment, stunned that he would gamble her. "You mean, us?"

He nodded, caught up in the madness of deliberate peril, the thrill of winning just coming within reach because he was impatient now. He didn't want to wait, didn't believe in certainty or love, only what he could grab with both hands.

Unprepared for his sudden spin (Russian Roulette with their relationship) Brennan shook her head as that sense of doom she'd just tried to dismiss reared its rumbling head. "No. The FBI won't let us work together as a couple—"

"Don't do that," he cut in. Impatient. Impulsive. "That is no reason why we can't—" and he was too impatient even to finish that thought, too impatient to reason with her. Instead, he simply grabbed her arms, jerking her forward and slamming his mouth against hers to stop her from disagreement. Maybe he thought it would stop her from thinking, but nothing could stop the terror of repetition._  
_

As warmth spread over her lips—he was tender even when rough—Brennan's heart responded, her body crackled into reaction. It would flood her fast, that chemical reaction of his touch pulling her into destruction because he was not patient. Already it was too late to stop the reaction, already they had reached critical mass.

But she tried to stop it anyway. Bringing up her palms to push him back, to contain it, she felt panic clawing at her. "No. _No_!"

"Why," he asked. And it was only because he couldn't remember why. "_Why?_"

_Too late, too late,_ her terror chanted. "You— You thought you were protecting me, but you're the one who needs protecting."

"Protecting from what?"

He sounded as bewildered as if she were speaking madness; he didn't know how close it was. There was madness in what he didn't know, in what she couldn't say, in all the stories of loss colliding in her memory until the only thing she could stammer was a warning.

"From me! I—" Grief and fear stole her breath as she saw his blood flowing and hotly slick under her desperate hands; his back arcing on the operating table while Dr. Jursik shouted _"Clear!"_ and there came to her the searing scent of burnt flesh and a series of squealing beeps from electrified cardiac tissues struggling to resume a normal rhythm. And the sleep that didn't end, until it ended with the question he never answered. _"Who are you?"_

There was too much to say, too many secrets, too many losses. She was being crushed under the mass of tragic history. "I don't have your kind of open heart."

She felt the shattering as the weight pressed down. Critical mass.

"Just give it a chance. That's all I'm asking!" He was starting to look a little wild-eyed and desperate as he realized the gamble was not going to result in a win.

It was too late for a win.

"No, you said it yourself; the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome." She knew the outcome already. Had lived it twice, and could not do it again even though by now she knew it was too late and she was doomed to lose again.

Too late, already too late.

Booth hovered desperately in front of her, clawing for purchase on the slippery slope that was sliding him down and away. "Well then let's go for a different outcome here, all right?"

It's too late, she felt fate thundering towards her.

Sensing Brennan's tension, the terror that gripped her, Booth laid claim on the wrong evidence. "Let's just— hear me out, all right? You know when you talk to older couples who, you know, have been in love for 30 or 40 or 50 years, all right? It's always the guy who says, 'I knew.' _I knew._ Right from the beginning."

Love at first sight? Love conquering all? That in which he no longer held faith? Resigning herself to the truth she knew, Brennan shook her head to refute him. "Your evidence is anecdotal."

_Anecdote: Definition 1: a short and amusing or interesting story about a real incident or person._ How amusing that he wanted her to believe he'd loved her at first sight when only a few weeks ago he'd told her it didn't exist. _Anecdote: Definition 2: an account regarded as unreliable or hearsay._ How could she believe him now, when he was no longer the patient Sniper? How could she trust a Gambler who didn't believe love could overcome the many obstacles in their path? How could she place her heart into the hands of a man who had already gambled it away?

How could she explain impossibility of them when he wasn't himself?

"I'm that guy. Bones, I'm that guy. I know."

But he didn't know, that was the problem. He didn't know what he couldn't remember, the patient certainty that he'd lost, the risks she'd already taken. He didn't know that he'd just set off the chain reaction that would tear them apart (because a Sniper lays in wait but a Gambler cuts his losses and walks away). He didn't know what he didn't know.

"I ... I am not a gambler." Though it was already too late to save her heart (losing his love was inevitable now), she wouldn't tempt fate and risk his life.

"I'm a scientist. I can't change. I don't know how."

She didn't know how to live without him. "I don't know how..."

The Gambler accepted his loss with a stunned disbelief that tore her open. "Please don't look so sad."

"All right. Okay." Her fear was undeniable, so much so that even the Gambler could see it. Booth sighed heavily and leaned away from her, his back against the wall. "You're right."

Critical Mass having been reached, Brennan knew the Chain Reaction would be self sustaining and nothing could stop it now. How fast, how long before total fission? How long before he was ripped away from her?

"Can we still work together?"

He paused, unable to look at her. "Yeah."

"Thank you," she whispered, knowing he wanted to cut his losses. Knowing he wanted to walk away.

"But I gotta move on. I gotta find someone who's ... who's gonna to love me in thirty years, or forty or fifty."

And that, right there, was the reason. The Sniper already knew it was her. The Sniper waited for her, knowing already that she loved him but the Gambler didn't know her at all.

"I know." Softly, she spoke and let him go ... because nothing can stop nuclear fission from splitting the center apart. Nothing would stop their annihilation.

~Q~

The walk back to the Metro station was quiet, filtered only by the voices of late evening tourists wandering past in clumps. In the train they sat side by side, each lost in their own misery until reaching her stop. She stood, half expecting him to remain but he stood also and they finished the commute in uncomfortable silence.

She paused at her door and turned to him. "We didn't have dinner. Do you want to come in?"

"Nah, I'm good." He turned to leave.

"Are we having breakfast in the morning," she asked.

"Uh, sorry Bones, I have a meeting tomorrow."

And that was how she knew the fission had already begun.

Seeing him flirt with Catherine Bryar only a couple of weeks later provided further evidence, as well as his absence from her evenings and mornings that she filled with lackluster social outings at first. (Hacker, to pretend she had 'moved on' so he could have a clear conscience when he moved away). When that mercifully concluded after five 'dates,' Brennan resorted to hours of unending work and the process of fission accelerated.

The greatest proof of his distance came from the bones and the way they spoke to her in a swelling crescendo that she could not resist now that fission was carrying Booth—and her connection to life—away.

~Q~

The bones never stopped calling, her nightmares grew, and the Gravedigger's trial was a suffocating force all on its own.

"So, everybody out," Booth ordered.

A long, wide path descended to the base of the excavated pit where a lonely freezer waited for her. Brennan felt Booth hesitating a few paces behind, his steps slowing because he couldn't move forward. She wondered if he was thinking of Parker, who was now ten years old. Booth had never reacted well when it was a child and she had never been able to contain her horror when it was a person confined in a small, dark space. All the elements of their nightmares were contained in this pit, in this box.

Scrunched in there. So small, so dark. Nowhere to move, no way to turn, no air, no light no food no water no life...

So familiar.

"Oh, god," she murmured, forcing herself closer.

The compulsion to open it and expose him (free him) warred within her but ultimately her drive for justice won. Don't rush, don't compromise the evidence. It was too late to save him but if she acted cautiously there still might be justice. Closer now, she saw the rusted edges, the lid closed over the container that held him trapped. It was old, not sealed.

She reached for the metal lip, sliding it with effort because of all the rust. It screeched and shuddered sideways, releasing wafts of decay and moisture to push at her face and force her to look away but she resisted because below the rotting stench she saw gleaming grey bones huddled at the bottom.

Behind her now, Booth stayed at the top of the incline and breathed out his own forlorn prayer as he beheld the absence of life. "Oh, God."

She looked inside, eyes searching the dark (dark in there, dark out here because it was night) and Booth called out to her from far away. "It's the kid, isn't it."

Small cranium. No twelve year molars. She didn't say this out loud, sensing she didn't need to. It's _a_ child, but was it _the_ child...?

"Terrence Gilroy had a remodeled right ulna from a break when he was eight," she told Booth. Flipping on a flashlight to shine into the box, illuminating him, she gently lifted his right arm. Sounds exploded in her, crying, screaming terror, banging, _'let me out! please!'_ and she felt the arm falling back towards his chest as she backed up a step and tried to speak above the noise.

Turning towards Booth, she breathed the truth out slowly, giving him time to adjust because the living parent side of Booth hadn't changed. "This is the boy she kidnapped."

Booth said, "I'll call the parents," and turned away as if he couldn't escape fast enough. That's what it felt like, even though Brennan knew why he was leaving and a remnant of her own living pain reminded her of living victims who needed relief. Ripping open boxes to show the cat had died, the work she still did with him must continue. Taffet had handed her the box with malice, dared her to open it.

"Why did she lead us here, Booth? Why did she want us to find him?"

He didn't have an answer.

Heather Taffet, smirking, had taunted her with a number that brought her here to this box that held death inside. A whirling kaleidoscope of coincidences brought her and Booth together, everything condensing into this haunting moment. Kids in boxes and car trunks, meeting Booth, nearly dying, kissing Booth, losing Booth, locked in small spaces, and the ever present fear because at any moment it could all be taken away.

It's always going to be like this, she thought bleakly.

~Q~

Later that night, Dr. Jack Hodgins stood nervously to the side when Brennan stepped to the table and reached for Terrence. Squalling winds howled in her ears while lightning flashed behind her eyes and she recoiled from the violence of pasts colliding. Pressure on her ribs, painful and suffocating and her arms flared with sharp, painful blows as she flailed and tried to escape. A hand closed over her throat, forcing her down and choking her into black unconsciousness.

And when she woke, it was to darkness and the hot, suffocating scent of her own recycled breath. The muffled sound of panic in a tiny space, the pain of broken bones, cracked ribs, hard to breathe, can't move, trapped in black.

Gasping, she dropped back again and felt Hodgins watching her. "What's wrong," he asked gruffly.

"Nothing, I..." She didn't have time for this. The trial would not wait, and Terrence Gilroy had waited long enough. Brennan shook her head, felt her body tremble from remembered reaction, and cast an almost desperate glance at her coworker, fellow sufferer, knowing he would and yet could never fully understand. "There are so many injuries," she remarked with slowly subsiding tremors.

"Good," Hodgins muttered.

She nearly gasped again, stunned at the brutality in his succinctly stated opinion.

Sensing her disapproval he added, "It's good the kid didn't make it easy for her if it will let the jury see what kind of monster she is."

"He was in pain." And terrified, alone in the black.

"Do you think she cared about that?" Hodgins spat.

Their eyes met, her head turned away from the wreckage of the boy and his eyes blazing with hatred over the wreckage of his own painful memories. It wasn't exactly an understanding between them, possibly only a cautious agreement to proceed. Hodgins dropped out and reached into the filthy freezer to collect soil samples. Slowly she turned back and stepped to boy's side again. Brennan drew a deep breath, bracing herself for the impact as she reached forward to trace the fracture lines marring his ribs.

"Hands off!" Caroline Julian bellowed from the base of the platform and Brennan stiffened at the abrupt command, pulling her arm back as if burnt.

"Ma'am!" the security guard objected when Caroline bulldozed past the card reader, up onto the platform, setting squealing alarms pinching at their eardrums. Caroline ignored the chaos of her own entry and ordered in a slightly more moderated tone, "No one touches a thing!"

Hodgins joined Brennan's side to gape at the Prosecutor. "What are you talking about?"

"This is our chance to get some hard evidence they can't dismiss," Brennan offered, but she sensed Caroline had come bearing bad news. The only times she could ever recall being ordered away from evidence by Caroline had involved injunctions or other incomprehensible legal edicts.

Sighing sympathetically, Caroline explained. "Not if you touch it. You can't act as an expert witness in a case when you are also a victim."

Hodgins objected, "We aren't victims in _this_ crime." That didn't make him hate the Gravedigger any less, however. His frustration carried through very clearly as the verbal restraints held his hands back and began to shackle him. Terrence's bones whispered discontent and Brennan resisted the urge to place a soothing hand over him, over both the complaining victims (one alive, one dead; both trapped in an unjust world).

Shaking her head, Caroline gestured helplessly. "We filed one complaint with seven counts. Since the trial started, you and Dr. Brennan are linked to _all_ the crimes."

Comprehension emerged, but it offered no comfort when Brennan finally saw the motive behind the number Taffet had taunted her with, the number that led to the box and this virtual confinement. "That's why Taffet wanted us to find the boy. She knows we're the only people who have the skills to connect her to the crime."

Her living victim shook his head, disgusted at being so thoroughly outmaneuvered. "And now our hands are tied."

Tied up in the dark, trapped in pain and fear and bleeding hope. The sound of ragged breathing never left her ears, and the sobbing cries of a terrified boy never abated. _"Don't leave me to another,"_ his bones seemed to whisper, _"Only you can really hear me."_

It was a gamble anyway, one Caroline was taking because most of the compelling evidence had already been eliminated at the evidentiary hearing and only _this_ case had any serious potential of winning a conviction. _"You want to proceed rationally, correct?"_ Booth had said it, redirecting her away from an emotional reaction when she'd discovered her mother's murder, when she didn't want to talk to her brother because it was painful. _"I think you're taking this too personally ... you can't personalize the work."_ Michael Stires, telling her not to personalize what had been done to Maggie Schilling.

What we feel doesn't matter, only _he_ matters. Only Terrence and the story he could tell. Once the goal became clear to her, so did the route to reach it. Brennan made the decision very quickly. "Not if you drop our case."

Caroline's eyes widened in slow motion while Hodgins huffed in disbelief. "Excuse me?!"

"If Caroline doesn't prosecute our kidnappings, we'd be free to testify as expert witnesses in the boy's case."

"You'd be willing to do that," Caroline asked, impressed.

"No," Hodgins objected impatiently, as if she'd forgotten their entire purpose in working this hard, staying up this late, enduring these horror-splattered memories. He wanted vengeance. "No, Caroline has to prosecute our case. Taffet tried to _kill_ us."

She'd tried to kill many people, Brennan reminded herself; she'd destroyed many families. She'd looked into the eyes of James Kent, the father of murdered twins. She'd felt his pain when Booth was taken. She'd felt the terror of the dark closing in and death stealing her breath. All sides of the horror raged in her like a cyclone that Taffet set loose with sociopathic dispassion. Keeping away from Terrence just enough to staunch the flow of pain, Brennan faced off against her friend, knowing he might not forgive her for this. "All of our evidence has been thrown out. The rational thing to do is to pursue a case with fresh, untainted evidence."

It was the only way to stop the hurt, but Hodgins exploded in fury. "Are you _kidding_ me?! Is it really that easy for you to forget what happened to us?"

Advancing on him, Brennan let her own anger surge forward. "I will _never_ forget what happened to us." Furiously, she ground out the names of fellow sufferers. "Or to Booth. Or this boy." Or to all the others, the pain that never ever stops and she could never seem to escape it.

At that, his eyes dropped in shame but Brennan continued relentlessly. "You are _not_ the only one suffering, Doctor Hodgins but your emotions have no relevance. Not if we want to convict Taffet."

Not letting himself see the boy, Hodgins turned to Caroline for support but when he saw her nodding encouragement as well, he fell back in defeat. Ripping his gloves off and throwing them onto the table, he turned and snarled, "This better work."

Another person leaving. Brennan drew a breath sharply at the blow. Caroline promised she could begin working on Terrence in the morning and left Brennan alone beside the boy. Reaching forth at last, she smooth a tender fingertip over his frontal bone as if brushing back a tendril of loose hair. "Tell me what happened," she whispered. "You have to tell me everything. It's the only way to beat her."

~Q~

It's always going to be like this.

The bones would whisper and she would listen. Science would tell the story, prove it true enough that she could try to bring them justice. People would question how she knew, and her own past would call it all into question. Time and again, the cycle would repeat.

Booth would advise her to let the jury know what a victim suffered while she would fight against letting them see too much lest they think she was projecting her own past onto the bones. Terrence deserved justice and she would get hers vicariously, as always.

"What do you say we ease up on the scientific stuff, okay?"

She shook her head, feeling the internal pressure mount. Feeling also, a haunting déjà vu as history repeated again and again. "The science gives us the height of the assailant. 162 centimeters. Taffet's height."

They'd done this before. "That's...that's..that's good and all, but Taffet's kind of had a field day, you know, trashing the whole technical goobledy stuff. And the jury seems to like her for it."

"But those are the facts." No one can question facts, no one questions science.

They were right back where they started, Maggie's trial being no different than Terrence's trial, and the stakes were just as high and the cost just as severe. "It's how you present the facts that win or lose a case, Bones. The jury needs to know what that little boy went through."

_"Don't front-load your testimony with a lot of technical crap."_ Because nobody wants the truth, they want entertainment. A good story.

It's always going to be like this.

~Q~

So she gave them what they wanted: the story, the subjective truth of what it felt like to be Terrence.

Brennan summarized her findings with all the passion she'd always avoided before. "The _five-foot-four assailant_ crushed the boy's chest, choked him and finally caused him a torturous death by burying him alive."

Heather Taffet gleefully pounced. "Objection. Speculation. She can't know what the witness felt."

Pushed to the edge of control, the lid rattled under mounting internal pressure until it lifted and she blew off steam in the form of spiteful disclosure. "I was buried alive, which makes me uniquely qualified to comment on its horror."

Only later did Brennan realize she'd been duped, had fallen into a trap set by the opponent who knew full well how to exploit her pain. "Objection, Your Honor. This is grandstanding. Unless the witness has any additional facts..."

It's always going to be like this.

When the defense finds out about her past, they use it against her.

"Dr. Brennan, don't you think your trauma as a kidnapping victim prevents you from being objective?"

Yes, she always worried about that. Yes, she always knew that she wasn't completely objective when the bones called out to her. It was always a struggle, _always_, to ensure no one else ever questioned her ability to to prove what she knew because she was the only one who could speak for them. She saw a face on every skull and heard a whisper from every bone but science alone made it fact.

"It's only natural that you would want to construct facts that would give you some closure and peace."

Nothing would ever give her closure or peace as long as the bones of the restless dead clamored to be heard. As long as she kept doing the same thing over and over, the result would always be the same. They would accuse her of making it up, or projecting. It was insanity to expect otherwise. "I resent your implication. I do not let my emotions cloud my findings."

"No, not intentionally of course," Taffet soothed. But then she asked, "Doctor Brennan, you are currently seeing an FBI psychologist, are you not?"

Forgive her, she's merely insane.

And Brennan recognized insanity well enough to see that it was always going to be like this. No one believed the prophesies of Cassandra, and no one would believe that Temperance Brennan could hear the bones whisper their stories. No one would believe what she could see unless she presented it with science. Take away science and all that remained was Tempe, with haunted eyes and stories of abuse that no one believed. Stories she couldn't prove.

Trapped again by her own past, Brennan stammered, "What? That has nothing to do with..."

"A yes or no is all that's required, Doctor Brennan. Are you currently seeing an FBI psychologist?"

"Yes, but—"

She smirked. "Thank you. No further questions."

Desperately, Brennan tried to explain. "No, that has nothing to do with this case. My findings are sound."

She never reported anything that couldn't be verified by a fellow scientist. She never testified to any truth that couldn't be backed by another expert witness.

"My findings are sound!"

But really it was hopeless. No one would believe her stories without the science. She would fight the same battle again, and again and again.

It was always going to be this way.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: The strands of this story are all coming back together now...


	38. The Solution in a Revolution

Author's Note: My apologies that this chapter is late. The way I write usually starts with me thinking of how to put things together. After that, writing usually happens pretty fast, but in this case, the chapter was extremely difficult to put together. I confess, I have struggled with this one.

* * *

~Q~

~The Solution in a Revolution~

~Q~

Princess: **I will away tonight.**

Ferdinand: **Madam, not so; I do beseech you, stay.**

Princess: **I understand you not: my griefs are double.**

Ferdinand: **Now, at the latest minute of the hour,**  
**Grant us your loves.**

Princess: **A time, methinks, too short  
To make a world-without-end bargain in.  
No, no, my lord, your grace is perjured much,  
Full of dear guiltiness; and therefore this:  
If for my love, as there is no such cause,  
You will do aught, this shall you do for me:  
Your oath I will not trust; but go with speed  
To some forlorn and naked hermitage,  
Remote from all the pleasures of the world;  
There stay until the twelve celestial signs  
Have brought about the annual reckoning.  
If this austere insociable life  
Change not your offer made in heat of blood;  
If frosts and fasts, hard lodging and thin weeds  
Nip not the gaudy blossoms of your love,  
But that it bear this trial and last love;  
Then, at the expiration of the year,  
Come challenge me, challenge me by these deserts,  
And, by this virgin palm now kissing thine  
I will be thine;**

_Love's Labor's Lost, Act 5, Scene II_

~Q~

Hodgins and Cam had come through with Brennan's last gasp of insight. It was Booth who had tipped her, however, not the boy Terrence. Booth who had bragged about Parker fighting back with bites, Hodgins who found dermatophagoides farinae (a dust mite) wedged in Terrence's right lateral incisor and canine teeth. Cam who found enough human epithelial cells to run DNA and with that final bit of linking evidence, Heather Taffet's lethal confidence finally took a hit.

But Brennan's was gone.

She allowed Booth to crow all ten blocks back down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Founding Fathers, his excited chatter filling her enough to hold everything else back temporarily. Finally he seemed to notice her disquiet.

"Bones, are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she responded automatically but knew she was very far from being fine.

"Well, do you want to get a drink?"

She wanted to be with him, and lately their hours together outside of work had been sharply curtailed so the offer should have appealed to her. The fact that it didn't (it would only remind her of what she couldn't have) merely indicated how wrong everything had become. Nodding, Brennan followed him into their place and let him settle her alone at a table while he went for their drinks.

Her head dropped into her palm while she considered the sources of her failure in court today and the solutions that would save her from fighting the same losing battles into infinity. She was too exhausted and invested to think clearly and she'd made a potentially unsalvageable mistake. If it weren't for Hodgins and Cam….

Booth was returning, cutting through the Happy Hour crowd with their drinks raised high and still riding his own high from that day's triumph.

"Did you see Taffet's face," he raved again. "She was completely blindsided. Okay, Caroline's closing ... it's going to kill, all right? So here we go." He was so happy when raising his glass to clink against hers that he almost didn't notice her lack of enthusiasm.

"That's it, huh?" But he finally saw it now, the exhaustion drawing lines on her face, the smudges that looked like bruises under her eyes, the weight that held her still and drooping. "Are you okay, Bones? Your team just nailed Taffet."

She shook her head slowly, mired and too tired to fight it. "I'm just tired."

"Yeah," he agreed weakly, not at all tired and buoyed by hope. "Yeah. It's been ... it's been a tough case."

Not just a tough case, Brennan admitted to herself. It was a tough life. Years ago she'd discovered what murdered people wanted from her, and Angela had warned her, _"You're going to lose yourself in here."_ She'd always managed to stay on the living side of things but only with Angela pulling hard and dragging her away; only with Booth's magnetism drawing her close so that she didn't linger long enough to let the dead take over; only with Hodgins and Zack to help shoulder the science, with Goodman and then Cam to force her to rest (when Booth and Angela weren't there).

But lately it was all falling apart. Hodgins angry, Angela in love (she hadn't admitted it yet but Brennan knew she and Hodgins were together again), Cam distracted by her role as the mother of a precocious teen, Zack gone, and Booth … fading from her life right before her eyes. Lately she was alone.

When she was alone with them, the hungry dead lay poised to devour her, grimacing maws opening to consume, to control, to sap her vitality for themselves. She'd avoided the danger in the past by staying in the past.

"It's not just the case. I'm tired of...of all of it. I'm tired of dealing with murders and victims and sadness and pain."

Bewildered, he studied her for a clue to what she was really thinking. "Well, Bones, that's what we do. All right? We catch the bad people and we make the world a better place."

"No, Booth. That's what you do and somehow I got caught up into it."

There were no living victims to morn and weep. She'd studied ancient remains, people who had passed out of life naturally and left behind only the faintest whispers of their lives. Skulls that stared blankly through empty orbitals rather than the flashing eyes and moving expressions of pain and grief that followed her every movement when she beheld them. She'd searched for knowledge and truth, had illuminated the past as a way to understand human nature. There was never any light or truth in murders, only darkness and pain that she fought against again and again.

Stung, he protested the subtle accusation "Wait a sec. Hold on. You were dealing with dead people long before we got together."

Not murders, she realized. She'd rarely encountered them before Booth and now saw she couldn't handle murders alone. Before Booth she did not deal in death, only in knowledge, so she corrected him. Reminded him of who she used to be.

"As a researcher, an anthropologist." Ancient and passive people made no demands and she could piece together their pasts through quiet observation at no risk to herself. She added to the store of human knowledge which meant she brought light into the world back in those days. Suddenly, a puzzle she'd always wondered over made sense: why Dr. Gordon Gordon Wyatt had switched from forensic psychology to cooking. He'd said he wanted to put good things into people instead of taking bad things out. Brennan felt relief of a sort, remembering what she used to do and that she could do that again. "That's how I can make the world a better place."

"And you do. Come on. You make the world a great place. Hey. Cheers to that, all right?" Another half-hearted toast that he followed with nervous soothing. "You're just anxious. All right? And tomorrow, when we have won, everything will be perfect. It'll be fine."

It's always going to be like this, she thought with weary resignation, unless something changes it.

~Q~

Buried alive.

A man had fallen through a hole in his floor, buried so long and deeply under the debris of his own life that he'd died that way. Isolated in his own home, surrounded by people who didn't even know he was there.

Buried alive.

Brennan bent closer to the decapitated, partially fleshed skeleton sprawled on a boy's bed. She saw robust long bones and calcification of the costal cartilages that suggested middle age. "Victim is male, in his forties."

Still enthusing over the Washington Capitals hockey puck he'd rescued from the pile of debris, Booth turned to regard her curiously. "That's it? That's all you got? I mean, usually you have a list of specifics that I don't even understand."

"I'm very distracted," she confessed.

"Yeah, I bet you are. Look at all the junk here."

"No, not that. You probably heard." He waited expectantly for her to tell him what he knew he hadn't heard. "About the full set of interspecies hominid remains that were found in the Maluku Islands...?"

Booth laughed. "Oh, I missed that one. Where's Mypoopoo?"

"Maluku," she corrected earnestly. "Indonesia. Anyway, this could be a crucial link in the evolutionary chain." It would change history and might revolutionize current understanding on human origins. It was work with the quiet, dusty dead who would lay silently and let her walk away when she was finished finding their stories. Seeking ancient truths instead of current ones might give her the respite she needed and the thought of being out in the trenches, working with safely ancient bones to bring forth light, sent a shiver of delight through her.

His offhand agreement sounded very much like redirecting a distracted child. "It will be huge, I bet. But what about the forty year old dead guy here." Booth directed her attention back down to the man buried alive and just that quickly the brief frisson of happiness flared out. A blown candle, all the light gone again. She felt the kinship with him tugging on her, the weight pulling her under just as it had pulled him. Trapped. Surrounded by things only she knew were important but no one else cared.

Squatting next to the severed skull she pointed out what she could already see. "There are apparent perimortem injuries to the temporal and parietal bones, and the squamosal suture." There were four gouges, grouped in parallel pairs and angling outwards like spokes. She reached out, knowing it would hurt.

"So, he got hit in the head, huh?" Booth glanced up at the rift torn into the ceiling, the place where this forty year old man had fallen back into the world.

Pain, betrayal, and abandonment hissed under her skull, aching just behind her right ear. Someone had hit him, yes, but there was more to his story than that. There always was.

~Q~

Thirteen hours ahead meant the call from Indonesia came in while she was at the crime scene with Booth. Brennan returned to her office to secure the remains and saw the blinking light on her telephone console. Upon retrieving the message, she listened to Dr. Morewood reiterate his gratitude for her interest in and collaboration with his efforts to organize the anthropological phase of the Maluku Islands project. As she might guess, they were searching for qualified experts to join the team and in the process of selecting candidates, they'd considered her as the lead Physical Anthropologist. They'd decided she possessed the requisite skills, credentials and organizational qualities to head the excavation's anthropology team. Would she like to join the excavation in progress on Flores Island?

Would she like to escape the darkness and despair that surrounded her here?

When the message ended Brennan sank down into her chair, looking around her office with a numbing sense of inevitability. Warm and welcoming, this space was _her_ space in the place that had been her metaphorical home for over eight years, the longest she'd ever spent anywhere. The thought of leaving her home left a hollow ache, and yet Brennan also knew Angela's long ago warning was on the verge of becoming her reality. She felt buried in here, lost in here, loosing herself and slipping into the darkness with them.

Cam popped her head into Brennan's office to ask if she should turn off the lights.

"No, I'm going to do a preliminary examination of the body we brought in this evening."

Stepping just inside, Cam asked gravely, "Are you sure? It's pretty late."

"I don't require much sleep," Brennan assured her. Indeed, the continuing nightmares kept her awake most nights anyway so she might as well spend the hours doing something useful.

Cam departed with a promise to return at seven. Brennan pushed herself up and approached the bones, hearing them murmur something indecipherable the moment she drew near and touched a humerus. A sensation of constriction washed over her, tight and oppressive. Burning hunger, too.

Brennan reached for the skull, smoothing her fingertips over the wounds that had hurt him most. _You don't understand, I don't **want** to be like this! I can't change._

Hadn't Booth said that once? We can't change who we are. Knowing she couldn't change (there were no exchanges on a gift this rare) Brennan shifted the skull, rotating it to try and see the parts that had been revealed under rotting, dessicated flesh. The bone felt empty, devoid of strength. She frowned, touching cautiously with her fingertips, then lifting and letting it fall with her palm. It felt empty. Wrong.

"Did you stop eating," she asked him softly. "You did, didn't you."

~Q~

Her most enthusiastically annoying intern accosted Brennan as she was returning from her stilted lunch with Booth the following afternoon. They hadn't spoken much and the letter he'd reluctantly shown her occupied a larger plot of mental real estate than she liked—so much so that she was actually relieved to hear Daisy's chirping call.

"Excuse me, Doctor Brennan. If I could just have a moment, and I'd like to preface my statement with a caveat. Your unquestionable brilliance—"

Brennan cut the obsequious drivel off impatiently. "What is it, Ms. Wick?"

"Okay," Daisy rambled, seemingly unable to focus on presenting concise information. "In your preliminary report you said the injuries to the temporal and parietal bones and squamosal suture were inflicted at the time of death."

"That's correct," Brennan confirmed crisply, wishing Daisy would get to the point. This was the reason she'd written a glowing recommendation for this particular intern. Daisy was skilled, learned quickly, and had great potential; but her annoying, nonstop chatter was enough to try the patience of nearly everyone around her. A wonderful placement anywhere else was surely the best situation for everyone involved.

Daisy hesitated, clearly reluctant to spit on it, or whatever the phrase was. She tilted her head to cautiously inquire, "That, meaning what I said? Or that, meaning what _you_ said? I'll read what you wrote verbatim."

"That's not necessary," Brennan attempted, in vain.

Flipping to Brennan's preliminary observations Daisy quoted, "'There are apparent perimortem injuries to the temporal and parietal bones and the squamosal suture.'"

Hadn't they just established this? Rapidly losing patience (already in limited supply), Brennan repeated, "That sounds correct." (If by correct, one meant this was what Brennan had first noticed at the scene, which is precisely what a 'preliminary' report is intended to preserve: one's _initial_ observations, which might later be amended as further information was gathered and analyzed.) She tugged on a pair of latex gloves and paused beside Tim's bones.

"How angry would you be if it were not correct?"

Brennan hesitated for a fraction of a second, attempting to puzzle out the meaning behind that question. Some professors did not wish to have their mistakes pointed out to them (but then how could anyone learn?) and Brennan prided herself on integrity. She also believed firmly in clear communication.

"You mean if I were wrong."

"I would never state it in those kind of bald terms. Does inaccurate sound better? No... Um ... erroneous?"

This might just go on for hours at the rate Daisy was dissembling. Keeping her tone carefully neutral, Brennan asked, "What have you found, Miss Wick?"

Apparently relieved at the lack of consequence for pointing out Brennan's humanity (nobody is perfect), Daisy stopped kowtowing and simply said, "You'll know instantly when I point it out." She led Brennan to the microscopic camera and flipped on the monitor, revealing the images she'd captured earlier. "Here ... and here under forty times magnification."

The gouges along the right side of Tim's head flashed briefly, then zoomed in to reveal reactive bone formation that had gone on long enough to begin actually remodeling the bone. The edges were filling in, repairing themselves from the inside out. He'd lived at least a week after being struck.

"Remodeling," Brennan confirmed softly. "The wounds started to heal before the victim died."

"Which means we have no clear cause of death. And even after your superlative recommendation, I am stumped."

No, the gouged injuries had caused the death. Brennan knew that because Tim's bones had told her. It started with the blow, but now Brennan knew her suspicions from the previous night must be pursued. Buried alive. "Please conduct a histological study of the bones."

"Yes, yes of course." Daisy hesitated, then asked blankly, "And may I ask why you want to do that?"

"There's something funny about the way these bones feel." He'd starved. She already knew that hunger played a role, and entrapment. She felt the desperation and helplessness, the hunger that gnawed, the suffocating weight that pressed her down into the grave with him. Little did she know that she'd begun to glow.

"Bones have a feel?"

"Yes. Touch them. Compare them kinetically to the thousands of other bones you've examined." Almost enraptured, Brennan lifted the left ulna to demonstrate how to do it.

Daisy followed the example, using his right clavicle as she tested for heft. Surprise bloomed in her animated face. "Lighter... My God, yes!" Abruptly, Daisy shifted modes and turned wistful as she looked upon the mentor she so adored and beheld a radiance she barely understood. "I wish you were coming to Maluku. It seems odd that you'd be missing something so important."

Brennan flinched, tempted and dismayed by the temptation. "The histological study, Ms. Wick."

Accepting the gentle chastisement, Daisy went to work collecting samples for histological staining and examination. The results confirmed what Brennan had known all along: decreased bone mass and a deficiency in calcium caused by a lack of nutrients over an extended period of time. Someone hit him, but what killed him was being buried alive. Trapped, alone, hungry, and scared, he'd been buried so long that he starved to death.

When Daisy came screaming into the lab a few hours later, gushing that Brennan had been offered the lead position on the anthropological team at Maluku, she knew she had to make a decision. She knew she needed to escape the hungry dead but first, she needed to talk to Booth.

~Q~

"Why didn't you leave?" Brennan whispered to Tim's skull. She held it gently, rotating it, tracing her fingers along the gouged injury that had crippled him. (Not killed. Death came from being abandoned in his hour of desperation. Death came because someone gave up on him.) "Did someone try to pull you away?"

Crackling energy vibrated under her fingertips, static and shouting buzzed inside her own skull. She closed her eyes, hearing an argument filtered through walls and time, faded and distant. Someone pleading desperately, pulling on her, trying to pull her away while she resisted. Opening her own eyes again, she looked down into his (blue eyes, murky with madness) and she sighed. "You should have gone with her."

But he'd stayed, and his own madness had led to his death.

Shivering, she sensed someone coming towards her on crisply clacking heels.

Cam stepped rather close, bearing a large cup of steaming black coffee. "You've been here all night?" It wasn't exactly a question, more like stating a fact that Brennan herself had overlooked.

Blinking, coming back to herself, Brennan asked, "Wha..? is it morning?"

"Yes," Cam confirmed gently. She set the coffee mug beside Brennan as an offering, knowing the anthropologist hadn't eaten or drunk anything for hours because she never did when she stayed up all night.

"I've been here all night," Brennan agreed distantly.

She was still holding the skull, still lost in the bones and what they told her. In the two years since she'd learned of Brennan's gift, Cam had watched it wax and wane and wax again. She'd observed the increasing obsessions, the growing glow of beauty, and knew Brennan was on the verge of breaking again.

"Did you find anything new?"

"Yes." Brennan tilted the skull towards Cam, sliding her gloved fingers along the grooved injuries. "These marks weren't caused by a hatchet or a knife. The direction of force is opposite to the direction of impact."

Physics were not her forte, so Cam asked for implication instead. "What would do that?"

"A propeller."

She raised a brow, quite surprised at this unexpected conclusion. "So, he walked into a plane?" (How did a recluse manage that in his claustrophobically cluttered apartment?)

"No, a fan," Brennan corrected. She sighed and set Tim's skull down gently, leaving him to gaze mournfully over the wreck of his own body. "The crime scene is full of them."

He'd used fans like band-aids over gangrene, a futile effort to patch and hide what had already begun to decay and destroy him from within. Death in the tissues, spreading outwards in sickly greenish purple hues, unfurling, reaching, infecting everything around it until there was nothing but death and destruction.

Gazing down at the incomprehensible marks Brennan read like Braille, Cam knew she was seeing what Angela had called magic. Magic that extracted a steep cost from the magician whose next trick would be to disappear into silvery mists until she was no more present than the ghosts she heard. "Are you really leaving the Jeffersonian?"

The cure for gangrene is amputation, Brennan reminded herself. Cut it off. So she steeled herself for the brutal loss that would save her. "Yes. For a year. I can provide you with a list of forensic anthropologists who can do this job."

Her smile seemed to weep as Cam contradicted fondly, "No, Dr. Brennan. You can provide me with a list of forensic anthropologists."

Possibly she didn't understand her own importance, that there was no one who could do what she could do. Brennan frowned, catching the sorrowful affection in Cam's words. "I don't know what that means."

It meant catastrophe inside the Jeffersonian. Losing Brennan meant losing vision, losing heart, losing purpose. They wouldn't function without her. Long ago Angela and even Booth had warned her what would happen if Brennan left: everything would fall apart.

~Q~

Love does not conquer all, Brennan decided. She sat at the brushed steel table in an interrogation room at the Hoover, feeling Booth behind her and knowing things that he could never see. She knew why Elaine was crying; she knew what it meant to give up and let go because love and hope wasn't enough.

Of course, there was also a difference between knowing and proving. Brennan knew, but the photographs and latent fingerprints were the proof. She slid the proof in front of Elaine's streaming eyes, telling what she knew with the empathy of mutuality.

"We found your fingerprints on the fan."

Without hesitation, Elaine confessed. "I was in love with Tim."

_I know,_ Brennan's heart sobbed in silent sympathy. _I know._

Booth moved closer, asking gruffly, "When was the last time you guys were together?"

"Over a year," Elaine answered.

A year since the coma. A year had passed since that one night and he'd forgotten it all and she'd waited a year for him to remember. She'd waited a year for him to recover. Brennan listened to Elaine's heartbroken story with her own searing story superimposed.

"I thought if I could just get him out of that apartment, maybe if the sun hit his face, he would change and we could have a real life, so... so I pulled him to the window, and... and I ripped down the curtain, and he lost it."

_If Booth could change, if I could..._ Brennan kept her face impassive while the pain roiled below the surface. Elaine's pain and her own; Tim's terror and her own. _There's nothing I can do._

Booth asked, "You two fought?"

Elaine had begun crying as she recalled that last, hopeless struggle to salvage with anger what could not be healed with love. "Well, he attacked me, so I pushed the fan at him, and I ran away. But I didn't think I killed him."

She turned to Brennan then, knowing instinctively that she was understood. "I loved him, but... there was nothing I could do."

~Q~

Booth would never remember; he was pulling away already, moving away already and Brennan knew that staying in the Jeffersonian would bury her alive.

The night she began packing up the contents of her apartment for long term storage, she heard a knock that surprised her.

Going to the door, she left her palms pressed against the wood while asking through it, "Who is it?"

"It's me, Bones."

"Booth?" He was there, late and unexpected. Not knowing why, she opened to see him standing on the threshold in his after work T-shirt and jeans and wearing an expression that she could not interpret. "Is something wrong?"

"May I come in," he asked, the formality striking her as inherently wrong after everything they'd become to each other.

Stepping back, she gestured him to enter and watched him pace nervously to her window and then back. To still him, she asked, "Do you want something to drink?"

He shook his head, stopped pacing at last and faced her. "I don't want you to go to Indonesia."

"What? Why not?" Hope beat a rhythm inside her thoracic cavity, thrumming tenderly in response to the way he was looking at her.

"She waited for him to change, but he couldn't. He couldn't leave that apartment."

"I know," she whispered, waiting for more. If only he could change back, be the man she'd known before.

Booth had reached out now, touching her cheek very gently. "You're trying to leave the apartment? You're trying to change?"

He was remembering what she'd told him when he'd gambled, that she couldn't change. But he would never remember who she really was. His fingers caught the first tear that trembled and tumbled from her lashes as she nodded and looked away. Nothing was working quite the way it should; she couldn't speak and tears were blinding and she didn't understand if this question would make things better or worse for them.

Booth tugged her closer still, so close it hurt because she was afraid it was merely an impulse: short lived, just like the last one. A sputtering flare of love that would blaze and flicker and die untended. "Bones..." He drew her all the way in, letting his lips convince her when his words could not.

The delicious pressure of lip on lip, the sweep of tongue on teeth, made her moan and lean into him. Pleasure poured through her, setting her spinning while his hands roamed and his mouth promised more if only she would surrender. "Don't go..."

"No," she murmured against him. "I have to go."

"Stay here," he suggested against her ear, sending shivers down her arms.

"Alone?" Needing a clearer head, she pulled herself away and reminded him, "You're going to Afghanistan. You made a vow and you have to honor it."

It was his turn to look away. "I'll try to get out of it. Can't you change here, with me?"

"They need a leader," she explained. "They're waiting for me and I _need_ to go."

"_I_ need you."

Why was he making this so hard? Moving back towards her bookshelf, she resumed packing and tried to gather her thoughts. "I can't stay here, it's killing me."

"Look, I understand that you need a vacation," he began, but she turned and heaved an exasperated sigh and he drifted off with his own sigh. Rubbed his face and fell silent to hear what she would say next.

"It hurts too much," she began softly. "I can't do it anymore." His expression turned fearful, as if he thought he was the one hurting her. (He was, in part, but she knew it wasn't his fault.) So she tried to tell him more, the pain that she could never escape and that wanted to bury her. "Booth, the murders will never stop. They'll never stop calling me. Angela was helping me but she's with Hodgins now and I can't stop seeing them. I can't stop hearing them."

"None of that makes sense," he argued. "Why Indonesia?"

"They needed a leader," she insisted. "Now they're expecting me. It's too late to tell me now."

"Tell you what?"

She wrapped up a Moche effigy pot carefully, swathing the white slipped ceramic pot in layers of white cotton batting. Looking up at him as she tucked the pot into a protective box, she finally asked, "Why do you want me to stay?"

He shifted closer, reaching for words that would pull her closer. "We're soul mates, aren't we? Meant to be together."

Shaking her head, she reminded him of the evidence he'd left her with over this last year and all the mysteries he no longer believed in. "You don't believe in soul mates, Booth. You laughed when Eddie Ceraficki said he'd wait fifteen years for Officer Grant."

"I believe in us," he countered almost desperately. "Please, just give me a chance."

"I need more than words when you've contradicted yourself so much."

Helplessly, growing frustrated, he argued, "What else can I do?"

She was a scientist, always looking for evidence. He'd given it to her once and though she'd tried to explain that night at the Reflecting Pool, Brennan now saw that she hadn't made her needs clear. "You can prove it."

"How?"

Brennan turned back to her bookshelf and ran her fingers over the titles, but one jumped out at her. Love's Labor's Lost. Her heart skipped, her fingers tingled. This was a gamble that would reveal the truth. Turning back to him, she proposed. "Soul mates wait for each other. You wait for me, and I'll wait for you."

"What?" This, clearly, was not what he wanted to hear.

"We'll both wait a year, while you're serving in Afghanistan and I'm leading the Maluku project. If we really are soul mates, we'll know when we meet in a year."

"No contact for a whole year...?"

"We'll meet at the coffee cart," Brennan suggested slowly, working the details out, seeing a symmetry in ending the experiment where it began. She'd been waiting for him to show her patience all this time, ever since that night. She'd been waiting for him to come back to her one year already, so what was one more? "Our coffee cart by the Reflecting Pool. Exactly one year from the day we last see each other. Exactly to the hour."

"Bones..."

"One year to prove it, Booth. If you still love me, tell me again in a year."

If he still wanted her when a year had passed (showing the sniper still was there), then she would trust it was worth the risk. She'd embrace the gambler.

When he rushed in to say goodbye at the airport, when he reached out to clasp her hand, Brennan's composure nearly broke. Tears and hope as he held her hand and vowed, "One year from today, we meet at the reflecting pool on the Mall. Right by the—"

"—Coffee cart. I know." Words throbbed between them, ancient but full of meaning by the clasping of their hands.

**Then, at the expiration of the year,  
Come challenge me, challenge me by these deserts,  
And, by this virgin palm now kissing thine  
I will be thine;**

"One year from today," she vowed as his hand pulled out of hers and he turned away.

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note #1: I don't know about you, but it's hard not to cry over this one.

Scientific Note: Perhaps I should simply say, 'don't get me started...' The way the the Maluku project is handled in the opening scenes of Mastodon in the Room is so far outside the realm of reality that I want to cry. Brennan and Daisy wandering around a jungle alone in a jeep...? Seriously?! Don't get me started.

So, in this story Brennan is part of a well organized team of experts. She's not in charge of the entire project, just the anthropologists on the team. There's a base camp. She has access to phones, computers, etc. Which brings me to my:

Author's Note #2: Though I've sometimes thought Booth agreed to go back to Afghanistan without talking to Brennan, here I'm seeing that she was breaking down and looking for escape already; and he knew it. He let her go because he sensed she needed to. Brennan might have hoped Booth would be willing to wait a year for her to recover. Since she is always looking for proof, what more proof could she receive than Booth holding constant a little longer like he's promised? What is one year compared to 30, or 40 or 50...? If he's sincere, he'll wait for her...

That's what she's hoping.

And that is what I see in their agreement to meet at a particular place and time, for a particular purpose, one year hence. This echos the end of Love's Labor's Lost (and I'm more convinced than ever that Hart Hanson lets Shakespeare influence some of his scripts). Despite what the season six opener seemed to imply - that Brennan cruelly cut off communication with Booth - I see it as a mutual agreement.

And finally, the reference to Eddie waiting for his soul mate is from the last scene of Bones on the Blue Line. Booth scoffed at the idea of waiting years for someone you're meant to be with.


	39. The Retrograde in the Return

Author's Apology: I owe thank you notes to many of you who left me wonderful reviews for the previous chapter. My computer time has been very limited this last week, so much that I chose to spend every precious minute writing so I could update (almost) on schedule and not keep you waiting. Hopefully I will get to the notes and messages I'm behind on later in this next week, once our summer immersion exchange student returns to France.

Author's Note: After the developments in the last chapter, things are a little different now. In some ways it's better and in other ways it's going to be worse. Nobody wants to go there, and believe me when I say that I don't like this either (which is why I'm dressed in flame retardant clothing right now!). It's necessary discomfort, however. Sort of like a root canal - which is awful but eventually it relieves pain - sometimes we just have to get through the bad to reach something good.

* * *

~Q~

~The Retrograde in the Return~

~Q~

**She never told her love,  
But let concealment, like a worm i'th' bud,  
Feed on her damask cheek. She pined in thought,  
And with a green and yellow melancholy  
She sat like Patience on a monument,  
Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed?**

_Twelfth Night, Act 2, Scene IV, Lines 115-120_

~Q~

Many things can change during the span of a year. In temperate climates, leaves change colors and fall to the ground only to sprout anew in the spring; but in tropical climates it's the rains that come and go (it was the dry season on Flores Island now). Hair that has been cut hair begins to grow out again. (She'd cut bangs one morning when Dr. Lundy swiped her hair ties as a prank and refused to relinquish them unless she joined him for dinner in the mess tent that night. She showed up alone that evening with the bangs, which made him freeze for a second before bursting into rather boisterous laughter. The following morning he returned the hair ties out of jovial concern that she'd go bald to best him.)

Many things can change but aside from the antics of Dr. Lundy, the occupation of her days seldom varied. New artifacts and fossils spread over her work table each day, waiting to be sorted and cataloged, and the trenches grew deeper as the months passed, yet these were merely variations on a theme. During all the days she toiled in the trenches and all the nights she tarried in the past, the memory of clasped hands held her steady in Maluku as she waited. It was quiet there (despite Lundy's teases and Daisy's nonstop stream of chatter and the never ending noise from insects, birds and mammals) because the bones were silent, and Brennan finally was able to rest. Her nightmares abated and trickled to a stop. She regained strength, regained perspective, reconsidered the option Booth had presented to her during their last encounter and her request for proof.

As her hand mindlessly applied gentle brush strokes to a slender fibula, her mind applied itself to the problem of what to do when her year in Indonesia had ended. The hope that Booth would still love her was what carried her forward, but the pragmatic reminder that he might not floated just alongside and kept her grounded. She prepared herself for both possibilities, but dreamed of being with him again.

Daisy prattled mostly about 'Lancelot' and expressed worry that she'd chosen unwisely as the reality of her broken engagement settled upon her. "He said he wouldn't wait, and that I shouldn't either."

Brennan's throat worked briefly, a noncommittal sound, and her hand kept up the steady sweep of bristles against bone, clearing away the dust of ages. Most conversations with Daisy consisted of the former intern speaking endlessly while Brennan made encouraging noises and actually processed the verbal stream as soothing background noise that replaced the whispers of the bones.

"Are you waiting for Agent Booth?"

Booth's name jerked her out of her stupor, causing her hand to stop moving and she hesitated, unsure of how to respond. Daisy was watching with those curious eyes (waiting for a cue, Brennan realized), so she gave a concise answer. "Yes."

"Oh, that's so romantic!" the younger woman gushed. "That's why you keep turning Doctor Lundy down! Is he waiting for you? Is that why you were holding hands at the airport?"

Uncomfortable with the uncertainty, Brennan nevertheless shrugged because there was nothing else she could do. "I don't know. I won't know until we return."

Appalled, Daisy exclaimed, "How can you stand it?!"

"I accept the fact that I have no control over another person's emotions." Some days it seemed she barely had any control over her own...

"I'm waiting for Lance," Daisy decided then.

This was how the first seven months passed, peacefully and productively, but when Caroline Julian called her home on an urgent rescue mission to save Camille Saroyan, Brennan made arrangements to leave the dig without hesitation. Daisy agreed to return as well, citing her antipathy towards reptiles and invertebrates as more than enough of a reason to leave.

Upon reaching the airport at Jakarta, Brennan indulged in electronic telecommunication for the first time since she'd left, sending email messages to Angela and Booth alerting them to her imminent return home. What surprised her when she reached Dubai nine hours later was finding an answer from Booth already waiting in her inbox, asking her to meet him at the coffee cart at ten pm the following night. Their flights arrived within an hour of each other (by coincidence) but at separate airports, so they would both be able to reach the Mall at roughly the same time, traffic willing. Surrounded now by a soaring steel and glass concourse instead of the rich green palms and azure sky she'd awakened under only two days ago, she considered once again how rapidly one's entire existence could change.

What would happen when she saw him again?

Her mind spiraled up and down with the possibilities until she felt dizzy.

Exhausted, grimy, and still carrying her luggage, Brennan stood at the head of the plaza below the Lincoln Memorial, searching the trees that flanked the pool and then turning to sweep her eyes over the brilliantly lit monument. This late on a weeknight found relatively few tourists and left them relatively alone down here by the shrouded espresso cart. As she turned around again, Brennan sensed his approach as a charge of electricity humming under her skin.

Booth was still in his camouflaged Army Combat Uniform, carrying a heavy stuff sack over one shoulder. And he looked cautious. "Hi."

A delighted grin spread over her features and she went to embrace him joyfully (and regardless of the outcome of their next five minutes, she would always be glad that their year had been cut short). Booth laughed awkwardly, only half returning the hug with an embarrassed chuckle and a shrug of his shoulder to shift the weight of his stuff sack. Immediately sensing his discomfort, she disengaged and met his brown eyes with resignation because it only took that one second to tell her where she stood with him. "Hi, Booth."

"It's been a long time," he said.

"Seven months," she agreed, thinking this kind of awkward 'little talk' was something they'd never done before and it was yet another clue.

Together they took a seat at the base of the steps, a little off to the side, and began to recount their separate adventures while away. Booth pulled a photo, showing himself surrounded by members of the Afghan National Police; however, Brennan thought they looked too much like soldiers and not enough like the police officers he was supposed to be training. She turned to him curiously. "So, was it dangerous in Afghanistan?"

He shrugged it off, what he'd done and what he'd faced while there. "Nah. What I did was mostly administrative."

"Because," she observed, "you seem really, very heavily armed in this photograph." Indeed, in addition to the large rifle he was carrying, they were standing in front of a tank.

"How about you?" Booth asked, taking the photo back as a means to change the topic of conversation. "Any headhunters or cannibals?"

Correctly guessing he was avoiding the subject of his own activities by asking about hers, Brennan offered, "Daisy and I were attacked by some armed guerrillas, but I ... I beat them up and we got away."

"You beat up armed guerrillas?!"

It was her turn to downplay the risk. "I had to; you weren't there to save me."

He chuckled again. "Oh, Bones..."

The warmth of being next to him slowly chilled away at his next question, because she knew what it meant. She'd been waiting for it, ever since the moment he didn't fully embrace her. "So, did you meet anyone special?"

She'd known instantly that he had not waited and now she had her answer in his haste to bring up the question of meeting someone else. He was hoping not to feel guilty, perhaps. Always in favor of open communication, Brennan clarified, "You mean did I have sex with anyone..."

Not in the least embarrassed, he smiled faintly. "I missed that about you. You know, you just _cut_ right to the chase. Yeah..." That's what he meant.

Quickly, as her pragmatic side slipped into command, Brennan initiated the protocol she'd already developed for this scenario. She replied with a reminder of what she'd intended. "Well, I was working. So, there was no time or inclination for sex or, romance." Neither time, nor inclination to be with anyone other than Booth. She'd waited for him, as promised.

Steeling herself now for the truth (the truth would set her free), Brennan drew a fortifying breath and asked, "How about you?"

A grin lit up his face, as if he'd been waiting for this opportunity. "Yeah, I'll, uh, show you..." Digging into his pockets, Booth extracted a cell phone and pulled up a photo of a lovely blonde woman with a heart-shaped chin. Full lips. Long, golden hair and a face that fit the golden ratio. Everything Brennan wasn't, at least in terms of looks.

"Hannah," Booth said fondly. "She's a journalist, war correspondent."

So, that was that. Brennan nodded and smiled, accepting the truth and reminding herself of the wisdom in having taken this course. Now she knew. Now, he'd moved on and she knew letting him go was the wisest thing when anything less than absolute dedication would destroy their friendship also. So she smiled and gathered the fortitude to ask tentatively, "How ... how did you meet?" (It was too hard to ask _when_; some questions were best left unasked and she foolishly hoped he would never tell her when.)

"Oh, I arrested her for being in a restricted area."

Brennan reminded him, "You arrested me once." Near the beginning, Cleo's case.

"I remember." The phone went back into his pocket.

"Where is Hannah now?"

He shrugged. "She's in Iraq."

That surprised her, the casual flick of his shoulders, the lack of pain in his voice. Unbalanced now, searching for meaning, she asked cautiously, "Is it serious between you?" Had it been only a fling? Could she hope...?

"Serious as a heart attack," he replied.

But again, his tone and mannerisms didn't match the words. Still somewhat confused, Brennan noted softly, "Heart attacks are very serious."

"Yes, they are," Booth replied, looking at her meaningfully. "Very serious."

Oh.

No hope then.

So it was settled at last. Brennan began building the first wall right then, the first of the many layers of bricks and mortar that she would need to release him and continue to function as his friend and partner. She felt distance rearing up between them as she stammered out how she was looking forward to seeing everyone. She felt her emotions retreating behind that first wall and she let them go there as Booth chided her for not staying in touch with the others.

The wall continued its work when Cam revealed her anger a little while later.

They'd all convened in a conference room in the Hoover, compliments of Caroline Julian (because the Jeffersonian's Medico-Legal lab had closed down).

After Cam told her that all of her interns had vanished, Brennan exclaimed with shock, "What happened? You're no longer in the Jeffersonian, all my interns gone!" Where was the other anthropologist who was supposed to replace her and continue mentoring the interns?

This was what had happened after she left: everyone else left, too. Cam had taken a job as the Federal Coroner when the Jeffersonian closed the Medico-Legal lab (which in turn scattered the interns) but in doing Federal autopsies Cam had uncovered brain damage in war veterans. As she spoke out about it, the government began gunning to shut her up with termination. Cam's current job was at risk because she couldn't identify a little boy's body on her own and that gave the government cause.

Cam snapped, "What happened is, you put your own desires ahead of everything else, and you left."

Uneasily, Brennan asked, "Are you angry with me?"

"Yes, I am angry, Dr. Brennan. We had a great thing going. You just... You let it fall apart." Then Cam left the conference room where they'd all gathered and reunited, following on the heels of everyone else who had departed for the night and Brennan found herself alone. Left behind.

Chasing after her, Brennan caught Cam at the elevators and called out "Wait!"

Her former boss (rival, friend) halted and held the door open much to Brennan's relief. She slipped through the doors and turned to confess how unsettled this news made her feel. (The wall was still only one layer thick, still easily penetrated.) "I never expected anyone else to leave."

"Yeah well, everyone did."

Drawing a shaky breath, Brennan pointed out, "It isn't fair to only blame me. Booth left, too. And Angela and Hodgins. Why aren't you angry with them?"

"Because _you're_ the lynchpin that held us all together. Don't you know that?"

"No I'm not," Brennan protested.

"You are," Cam insisted fiercely. "You leave and everyone else leaves with you."

"I ... I'm sorry." The door pinged and opened to the parking garage. Cam went out, leaving Brennan to pause at the door and then trail out after her. "I never meant leave you abandoned. I wouldn't do that."

But she had. The similarity between what she'd done (left to save herself, leaving Cam alone with a trusted 'brother and sister' who left as well) and what her own parents had done to her made her stomach churn.

Stopping at the door leading out to where the cars were, Cam turned back again and sighed. "I know that."

"Then I hope you know I'll stay. I'll help you save your job."

"And what then?"

Resolutely, she answered, "I won't let it happen again." She would never again leave the people she loved, no matter what it cost her to stay.

~Q~

The solution to saving Cam's career was using her influence to get the Jeffersonian to reopen the Medicolegal Lab and restore Cam's position as 'the boss.' Angela stayed because she was pregnant; Hodgins stayed because of Angela; Booth stayed because of Parker. And Brennan stayed for all of them.

After the others left to get drinks, Booth and Brennan tarried to take in the mammoth* in the lab. They'd welcomed each other back, both standing in the remains of the old lab and staring at a stately woolly mammoth on display behind glass, complete with fur and a raised trunk. Brennan glanced at Booth and he spotted it out of the corner his eye and turned to her. "What?"

"I'm just glad to see you," she admitted.

"Yeah, me too," he responded but didn't sound quite as sincere.

Glancing back toward the mammoth, Brennan felt facts from the Pleistocene tumbling through her mind as a buffer. They ate grasses and sedges and were highly adapted to life in a cold environment because of the long, thick guard hairs that protected a soft undercoat of insulating wool. And they had thick skin, a sort of dermal shield to protect them from harsh elements. Mammoth bones occasionally show evidence of osteoarthritis, spondylitis (inflamed vertebrae fused together) and remodeled fractures, indicating both long life and protection from a herd. Humans and Mammoths are social creatures and don't survive as well alone as they do in family groups. Her musings were interrupted by Booth's question.

"Are we still going to be partners?"

Startled by the question, she turned to him with a worried frown. "Why are you asking me that?"

"Because you seemed to be pretty eager to get away from me last year."

"No," she exclaimed involuntarily, before rational thought even had a chance to assert itself. "It wasn't you I needed a rest from."

She felt a chill that would make the mammoth feel right at home when he prodded, "Wasn't it?"

"No," she repeated firmly, "not you. I needed a rest from _me_."

He laughed without humor. "Oh, it's been a while since I've heard that one."

"What one?"

"_'It's not you, it's me.'_ Classic break-up line."

"That's not what happened!"

"Isn't it?"

Doubtfully, she replayed their final two conversations for anything she might have said that would indicate a desire to sever their personal relationship. Coming up empty, she reminded him of her need for time to heal and process. "I just needed time and ... and space. I needed perspective."

"About what," he challenged. "Whether you trust me or not?"

More miscommunication, the bane of all of her relationships. Despite always trying to be honest, stating her intentions clearly (and always ensuring she knew exactly what and why she intended), getting other people to understand her was a constant challenge. Understanding anyone else, nearly impossible. Even Booth, it seemed, which was just another sign that she'd been right to refuse a gamble on him. Perspective gained, right there. "That wasn't what I needed perspective about."

"Then what?"

With Hannah lurking in the background now, Brennan switched to another perspective she'd searched out, the safer one she'd already tried to tell him that last night as she was packing. "Whether I could continue to investigate murders with you, but it was only the murders that I wanted a rest from. Not you."

"Solving murders is all we are," he said quietly. "That's what binds us."

Years ago, when they'd first begun seeing Dr. Sweets for partners therapy, they'd had this discussion. If there were no murders, they probably wouldn't even see each other. It wasn't true then; now, it might be. Swallowing a hard lump of icy sedge and snow, she shivered and wished he could remember the rest of it, the warm parts that had nothing to do with death.

"If there were no more murders, we'd still have coffee. Right?" But he didn't affirm it. Seeing the tensing of his jaw, Brennan searched her memory for meaning and concluded it was a sign of negative emotion. "Are you angry with me?"

"Maybe a little." He turned and started to leave the room, leaving her in a state of doubt. What did that mean?

Was he angry about her proposed waiting period, that she'd tested his resolve? (And the fact that he didn't wait only proved her correct again, because Gamblers aren't patient.) Was that the reason for his anger, or was it something else? "Will you tell me why?"

Her question caught him at the door, where he halted and tightened his hands and tensed his shoulders as if in preparation for a battle. "Afghanistan wasn't very restful for me."

_Is that why you didn't wait?_ That's what she wanted to ask him but vowed to be like a mammoth with a thick skin to keep hurts out and long guard hairs to keep her heat inside. The questions she wanted to ask would only throw accelerant onto the his smoldering anger, or hers. It was dangerous to probe too deeply into what had separated them, so all she could do was try to soothe. Softly, she offered, "I'm sorry," and hoped he wouldn't ask for the specifics.

"Yeah, me too." And this one was sincere. She knew he meant it. And though she could not have explained how or why she knew this was not the sort of apology that precedes an end, somehow she did know it, that the exchange of regrets signaled a restart. Renaissance. Rebirth. Renewal. Reset. (Why do they all start with the letter 'R?' And why did this feel better than she expected?)

~Q~

"Doesn't it bother you that Booth is with Hannah now?" A few weeks had passed, and Angela was propped up on Brennan's sofa, munching saltine crackers with sips of juice to quell her daily attack of nausea.

"No, why should it?"

"You didn't like it when he was dating Catherine." Another cracker serenaded that observation, followed by the crackling of the plastic as Angela twisted away the rest and set them aside. "I hate saltines."

"You should be eating whole grains with hummus," Brennan admonished. "The chickpeas—"

"I know about the chickpeas," Angela cut in with a smirk. "You're changing the subject."

Sometimes redirection worked so it was always worth a try. Shutting down her computer for the day, Brennan reflected on the two different relationships and how they differed. "I accepted Catherine also."

"Give me a break, Bren. You looked like you were walking around with a knife in your heart."

That was because he hadn't waited and even though she'd let him go, it hurt to watch him leave so fast. "It's different now," Brennan insisted, and felt sure of herself. Time and space had given her perspective.

"What's different?"

"I think..." She hesitated, trying to find the right words. "I think he needed Hannah."

The sarcastic laugh struck a cynical discordance as Angela rolled her eyes. "Oh, he needed to release his biological imperatives. Is that what you're suggesting?"

Gathering a set of forms as she prepared for another night in Limbo, Brennan shook her head. She set the paperwork down on the corner of her desk and took a seat by Angela's feet. "I fear something happened to him in Afghanistan."

"What do you mean? I thought he was just training the police over there?"

"He showed me a photo, where he was dressed in battle gear and carrying a very large weapon. I think ... he hates it when he has to kill people."

"You think he killed somebody?"

"I don't know; he won't talk about it." But in fact she did know: Hannah had revealed it in the telling of how they'd met. Booth had been hidden in a blind and took out a sniper that was shooting and endangering Hannah's life. Granted, he'd wounded that particular enemy rather than killed; however, the fact that Booth had been in the position of sniper told Brennan what she needed to know. He'd 'seen action' over there, which meant his cosmic balance sheet had probably shifted balances. It wasn't much of a stretch to imagine he'd been forced to kill again.

"We'd agreed not to communicate with each other and he was alone over there. Maybe Hannah was there for him when he needed someone to talk to and if so, I'm very glad. I want him to be happy. That's all I've ever wanted."

"At your expense?"

"What are you talking about?"

"You were hoping he'd come back to you. God, we all were."

Her eyes dropped, a slow burn catching her in the center of her chest. "No, Angela. I knew he wouldn't. This is exactly what I expected."

Struggling to sit upright (because her barely tamed nausea objected the sudden movement quite strenuously), Angela exclaimed, "This is what you meant when you said you were living the life you expected?"

Sadly, she nodded. "I'm his friend. That's enough."

"No, it isn't. It can't be."

"It has to be," Brennan replied firmly.

"So you're just going to stand back and let them be together?!"

"Of course. Friends support each other."

Utterly flabbergasted, Angela could only shake her head with lingering disbelief. "He is making a huge mistake."

Brennan's hand on her arm stilled her, and she looked up into Brennan's clear-water clarity that spilled out of her gaze. "Don't, Angela. Let them be happy."

Still holding her friend's gaze, Angela repeated, "Like I said. Huge mistake." Seeing the shift into visual pleading (which Brennan could do extremely well when Tempe's pain glowed in her eyes), the artist wilted and gave up with a marginally sincere grin. "Okay, don't worry. I'll be supportive."

"Thank you."

Angela would refrain from sabotage only because Brennan had asked, because friends support each other. And she was too queasy to start a fight anyway. "Will you hand me the crackers?"

"Only if you'll promise me to eat the hummus I brought you."

"Oh God. That stuff tastes like garlic glue."

~Q~

* * *

Author's Note: You know how hurricanes have an eye that is calm and eerily beautiful? This was the eye. The other side of the storm is about to hit...

*Scientific Note: The episode title was Mastodon in the Room, but that was actually a wooly mammoth behind the glass. Mammoths were large and had long, curling tusks. Mastodons were much smaller and had shorter, straighter tusks.


End file.
